How long do you guys wait to decal after coating the model with Future?
I have always waited 48 hours and found that the safest route but there is a guy on the ARC that is saying that an " Industrial chemist" told him it only needed 15-20 minutes and it is as dry as it will ever be. [:O]
I told him the guy was smoking crack. [(-D]
That is very bad advice if you ask me.
I think that’s bull too Mike… while I will feel safe after an hour or two with decaling, 15 to 20 minutes seems short. I wouldn’t even dare touch a kit until at least an hour after Future, I’d be afraid of a wet spot or it being just wet enough to leave a fingerprint if I handled it… I think the shortest I put decals on a model after futuring was 45 min or so (tonight as a matter of fact haha) It did fine but clouded with the setting liquids… no biggie they’ll be clear tomorrow…
The future turns white with the Micro Set and Sol if you don’t wait the 24-48 hours, but in a day or so it will clear up… any left over haze clears with an overcoat of Future after that…
I never try to decal any sooner than a couple of hours just to be sure. A memory of my days at NTC Great Lakes. We used Future on our barracks floor once a week. Put it down with a sponge and was walking on it an hour later with no problems.
Future is an odd crittur. It is very tough, very fast, but it does not achieve maximum hardness, toughness, or chemical resistance for 24 to 48 hours after it is dry to touch. (humidity dependent) The critical thing is that most coatings are fragile when just touch dry—Future repels slow bullets at that point.
I sincerely hope that the organic chemist who developed it has been living in very comfortable retirement ever since—he/she/they deserve it!
A couple of years ago during the “Mad Tiger Day” group build, I decalled over Future that had not had a lot of drying time. I am sure that I waited more than 15-20 minutes, but I doubt that I had waited as long as an hour. For that build, I did use decal solvent to settle decals of the Tiger’s zimmerit and had no ill effects. On the other hand, even with that experience, I usually would wait at least until the next day or that evening if I sprayed the Future in the morning. With the time that goes into assembling and painting a kit, I don’t think it makes sense to rush one of the final steps.
15-20 minutes?? I agree with the above… something wrong there. Especially when the instructions on the bottle itself says wait 8 hours before you apply a second coat of future. So I can’t see applying a vinegar base product 15-20 minutes after applying it.
I usually wait 12-24 hours. Usually it is the last thing I do before I quit working on the kit so I won’t be tempted to move ahead when it is dry to the touch.
I used Future for the first time on my latest project, not exactly with great results, but not bad considering it was the first time I had used it. I think I waited almost 2 weeks before I decaled it, and I waited almost a month before I overcoated the decals to make sure everything was dry, and yet, my decals wrinkled a little??? What did I do wrong?
Personally, I normally wait 16-24 hours before decaling, but that has more to do with not having enough time to devote to this madness/hobby. This is a product designed to finish floors. Vinyl floors. Like the kind you find in kitchens and bathrooms. Imagine having to wait 24-48 hours before using your kitchen or bathroom! It must set up faster than that!
I’ve always waited 24/48 hours, but that was because that’s what I did when applying clear coats before I started using Future. But I’ve often wondered if the wife and I can walk on the floor and start putting the furniture back an hour or so after applying Future to the floor why can’t I apply decals to a model within a couple of hours after the Future coat is dry? Methinks I’m going to have to drag out a couple of my paint hulks and do some experimenting.
I’ll add a caveat that I wouldn’t dare use a decal setting solution until I was absolutely sure the Future is cured. The one time I tried to use Micro Set shortly after spraying Future it caused the finish to turn milky white. Something that doesn’t happen after 24 hours.
Yikes… 15-20 minutes does sound pretty short before decaling. I’ve always done what most of you do. I shoot my future coat as the last step for the day and then come back to it 24-48 hrs later on. My biggest concern is using something like Micro Sol or Micro Set. I love those products but I just want to make sure I dont’ run into problems with my future coat.
The only time I get wrinkled decals is when I use something to set my decals. But the wrinkling goes away and the decal ends up smooth again.
Only thing I can think of is that something interfered with the bond of the decal to the underlying Future—poor decal adhesive, or old adhesive, or a slightly contaminated surface under the decal. Future does not shrink much as it cures, but it does shrink. Future bonded to Future or another acrylic doesn’t crawl, but with a decal interface, it might. This is a good arguement for using Future as a placing and setting solution, as some have suggested in FSM.
One thing I learned the hard way: If you let a model sit for any length of time, protect the surface from contamination. You’d be surprised what settles out of the air even in the cleanest home environment! When you wait, protect or clean the surface, or both.
For all coatings, including Future:
Tack dry—coating still soft and tacky, but not removed by light contact.
Touch dry—coating not deformed by normal, light handling, but not fully cured. Not a good time to apply decals. This is usually the best recoat time.
Cure dry—essentially complete polymerization of coating. Some solvents may still be present and slowly migrating out. Some coatings continue to polymerize for a long time after initial cure, becoming harder and tougher with time. May not be the best time to apply decals.
Somewhere in here is where you should apply decals, preferably closer too:
Hard cure or solvent-free cure—no more solvent escaping from the paint. For some coatings, this can take a very long time. That is rarely the case for most modeling paints unless applied in a very thick coat, and the instructions usually warn you if it is.
Future reaches cure dry very quickly, but does not reach a solvent free state for some time after that. I also suspect it is one of those coatings that becomes harder and tougher as it ages.
Bill - I’ve had that happen, either sitting overnight or spraying another coat of future on top gets rid of it.
What did you overcoat the decals with? If it was an enamel or lacquer dullcoat that would be the reason. If there is the slightest air bubbling or poor adhesion of the decal to the plastic, a strong solution like dullcoat can wrinkle it. I usually overcoat with future before AND after decalling and then do the dullcoat, even though I am using acrylic dulls now… I figure one more layer of protection for the decals themselves can’t hurt!
I agree Tom and have always done that.
I also do not use Testors Dullcoat and prefer an acrylic dullcoat any day.
Lacquer based products have no place other than cleanup in my opinion. [;)]
Agreed Mike - plus the acrylic dulls like Poly Scale and Vallejo are much more uniform in dullness, and more flat than the Testors stuff in my opinion.
It didn’t completely go away with time, but disappeared when I sprayed the other coat. Gave me quite a scare at the time!
luckily someone here had the same problem before I did… I was waiting on it… but the first time I used Micro Sol, it about made me faint when the decal crinkled up like that!!! haha
I put another coat of future over the decals to seal them before I did the panel lines. Most of the wrinkles have gone away, but on a couple of the small ones you can still see them.They aren’t real noticable, so I guess I will just have to live with it now. Hey, sorry to hijack the thread like this [:D]