questions on clear coats+decals.

It’s probably been asked before and will be again, but here’s my senerio; I built Tamiya’s Mustang III all was going well, I did the decals, they cracked a bit, not the best but with a little patience everything went all right (I put clear gloss enamel on first, everything on it’s enamel, hand painted 'cause I’m a student and can’t afford an airbrush and am a sucker for punishment anyway-though I’m discovering ways of getting a decent finish with a bruch -preshading works by hand too) So I weathered with pastels for the first time and went and got a can on Testor’s dull coat to seal it all up (had already gone over the decals by hand with some matt clear) When I sprayed it seemed like the paint was eating up the decals, they turned white and bubbly of crystalish, even where I didn’t even spray enough to have 100% coverage I was seeing hints of it (wing roundles were worst off and it was mostly the roundels and colored decals that showed this) When I went to spray the bottom I masked the fuselage sides as not to spray them further thinking at this point I could get away with just redoing the wing roundels on the top which I had spares for, when I took the masking off chunks of the decals came off aswell. Can someone please tell me what I’m dealing with here, is this sub pare decals, or is the testors or arosol clear coat in general a no-no? it was a frustrating night 'cause this plane was turning out pretty nice up til then (plus my lamp fell over busting the bulb putting glass everywhere, that didn’t help much) Anyway insight would be appresiated. Thanks for reading.

How long did you wait before applying the dull-coat? You should wait at least 24 hours after putting decals on for them to completely set (I’ve been impatient before and got the bubbling problem). 24 hours is the minimum I’d recommend, based on my experience.

As for the masking…if the decals were wet (or even if they weren’t) and not sealed yet by a dull-coat…which you hadn’t applied yet…they’d gonna be too fragile for tape to be applied to them. I don’t think it was a decal quality issue, so much as a combination of factors.

I agree with John about the masking and drying. This very well could have been the problem. However, I have had some VERY bad decals come out of my Tamiya kits. Not that these were old kits either. I’ve spoken to a couple of other guys that have had severe cracking and really strange reactions to some products like clear coats, Future and the like. They are not the most consistent kit decals. I almost always used AM decals on my Tamiya kits for this reason. (You’d think that a company that produces such awesome kits could get someone printing them up some righteous decals.) Perhaps it was a product/process combo that ate your roundels. You know, nature AND nuture. Either way, sorry to hear it and good luck with the patch-up.

G’day,

I agree with what has been said before, in the case with Tamiya, most of their decals are to thick and need a lot of decal solution to get them to settle down properly. With the pastels for your weathering they need to be sealed, before any dull coats are applied as the dull coat washes them off. With the rattle can, [we all had to start somewhere with our model painting], shake the can for a couple of minutes, then put it in warm water about half a can depth, for a minute or two, then shake it up again before using it.

I hope this helps.
Rob.

The Testors Dull Coat is your problem. This is a lacquer based material and it will indeed eat up decals, I’ve had this happen to me before and it sucks. This is why I only use Polly Scale clear flat as my finish coat. It is a water based acrylic and I apply it with an airbrush. If you want to brush it on with a paintbrush simply add a few drops of Liquitex Flowaid and have at it. This stuff is completely safe and will never damage your decals. Sorry to hear of your situation but you must charge ahead and build more!

Swanny, can you put the Polly Scale stuff over enamel paints and a laquer gloss-coat?

You can put Polly Scale clear flat over ANYTHING. That’s why I like it so much. I use all sorts of paints, lacquers, enamels, acrylics, e-coats and powder coats (those last two are on metals only) and the Polly Scale is fine on all of them.

I had the same problem when I built a 1/48 Revell/Monogram F/A-18C and used Testors dull coat. The decals dried, cracked and lifted off the model![:0] Swanny hit it on the mark…Polly Scale Clear Flat is awesome![:)]

Hey, thanks for the advice, it had been a least a day since I had put on the decals before I sprayed so I think swanny probably nailed my problem, funny 'cause I was pondering the use of testors anything 'cause I’ve never found anything they make in the relm of enamel paints which I’ve liked, I’ve only ever tried one can of their higher end paint, what’s it? Model master? the RAF trainer yellow, I think it would have taken fourty coats to get coverage.

The Model Master paints are not too bad. Yellow is a case in itself with just about anybody. The trick is a good white or gray primer first. For white paint railiroad Reefer White is your best best for good coverage.

As an alternative to the Pollyscale flat clear that Swanny mentioned, you could try Gunze Sangyo flat clear (airbrushed or brushed), It’s also water based and does not affect decals at all. Testors Acrylic flat clear works well too. I’ve gotten some good finishes brushing that on. It is also gentle on decals.

Tamiya decals are notorius for not liking any kind of lacquer overcoat. I’ve ruined many a decal with Tamiya lacquer spray cans and testor spray cans. So I don’t think you did anything wrong.

Hope this helps.

Just gotta say I’ve been impressed by Tamiya’s customer service, I didn’t feel like looking for after market decals 'cause it’s so close to being finished and some of the decals are fine so I called up the customer service people in Toronto and after a brief conversation on whether we’ve gotten snow here in calgary (not yet but it’s looking like it might hit this weekend) he said “no problem, we’ll mail you out some.” That’s pretty nice. thanks for yet more clear coat advice guys.

I’ve rung this same bell so many times I’m sure it’s growing old with some of the regulars around here, but this is my mantra: If you can’t afford an airbrush yet, or you want something with more coverage than an airbrush, but more control than a spray can, spring the 14 bucks for a Testors spray gun. This product comes with a can of air (hear me out about the can of air before saying it’s too pricey). This gun snaps over the canned air, and you can attach the bottles that come with it, or it fits standard Model Master or Poly Scale-size bottles and you can spray it straight from the cow. I don’t know why, but when I accidentally discovered this product, I found immediately that it uses the air much more slowly than I have found using an air brush with canned air (very impractical, if you are at all a prolific modeler). I’ve found that for larger areas of color (say, four or five square inches) or solid color planes, it is so much better than airbrushes. And you don’t have to clean anything but the bottle top with the feeder tube. Snap one color off, another one on and you’re good to go. I have done several soft-edged, multi-color schemes with the spray gun, and next to my airbrushed finishes, you can’t tell the difference (it’s all in the masking). Now, for a mottled FW-190, I don’t think I’d go there with this air gun, but give it a try for most of your needs until Santa brings you an air brush. Oh, and they give you a half-dozen standard a/c shades of acrylic with it, or you can get the one with bright auto colors, for what it’s worth.
TOM