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Awkward paint jobs!

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I hate painting bodies especially polycarbonate, can't stand the masking detest the cutting out and ****htened to death of ruining the decals. 

Some are a lot easier than others like if the whole body is one colour or the windows don't need masking. 

I'm struggling with a Opel v8 coupe body at the moment trying to get the right shade of yellow is trying my patience(on my second attempt) and the masking the worst I've ever done😧

Worst body out of about 25 for me has to be the Repsol Escort Cosworth, never again. Most of us don't have the skills of @Truck Norris unfortunately! his work is stunning, must have more patience than my wife! 

What the most difficult body that anyone's done? Love to hear  if I'm not on my own but will feel a bit daft if I am😳

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Don't know why the word ****htened is edited 🤔?? 

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That's how much I hate doing decals, I'd rather paint em :lol:

Hardbody painted from the outside, polycarb 1/8 scale painted from the inside as is traditional. 

I've done some real messes in the past but with time, patience and Tamiya masking sheets I feel more confident. 

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Painting the inside is easiest - just need to reverse the brain

but sometimes painting is far easier than trying to get the stickers to wrap

the neo scorcher shell is a fkin ball ache as the whole cabin is a white sticker - if I’d had the confidence I have now I’d obviously paint it inside 

isn’t fr!g a s3xual act?

JJ

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16 minutes ago, Problemchild said:

 

isn’t fr!g a s3xual act?

 

I believe so! But not when you put 'htened' after it😕

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1 hour ago, Problemchild said:

Testing

Analysis 

JJ

It’s ****htening where your mind goes 

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Nice paint job.

Decals are easy:  Dip them in soapy water (fairy liquid soap like the kind you have under the kitchen sink) before applying to body.  A few (5-8) drops of liquid soap in a small bowl of cool or warm (not hot) water does nicely.

Even very large/long decals can be easily applied this way.   No worry about bubbles/creases/curves or slight alignment problems as you lay decal down compared to using regular (dry) methods.

Steps

  1. If decals are pre-cut, skip this step.  Use hobby (Xacto) knife, cut around decal edge as desired.
  2. Peel decal from backing sheet and dunk into soapy water bowl. 
  3. Apply now-wet decal to body (sometimes it helps to use your wet fingers to pre-wet the body before laying the wet decal on it).  Basically, the more water the better because it gives you more time to slide the decal around before it sticks.
  4. Trying not to press down, slide the decal around until desired position on body is found.  If decal starts to stick before final position is found, pull off and re-dunk in bowl and try again.  If decal sticks too quickly (does not allow much sliding before it sticks), you may need to add another drop of soap to the bowl of water.  You can keep dunking over and over until you get the decal to lay exactly where you want it so do not be afraid to keep trying.  I've probably dunked a single decal up to 8 times before finally getting the decal into the position I wanted.
  5. Once final position is achieved, press decal down slightly near the center to start getting it to stick.
  6. Using fingers, press/slide and slowly squeegee out the water under the decal by rub/pressing from center of decal outwards, making sure that decal does not slide away from desired position during this process.  If it does slide off position, pull decal off, re-dunk and apply again.  Sometimes I use a paper towel to soak up the water that is coming out from under the decal, especially when pushing water out from inside corners.  Take your time getting the water and micro-bubbles out.  It can take 5 full minutes of rubbing to get the water out from under the decal.  If something goes wrong during this process, usually you can pull the decal off and try again, so don't be afraid to do that if needed.
  7. Inside corners should be pressed into place using fingers, a Q-tip, soft plastic stick or wet wood toothpick before pressing down either side to better follow body contours.  You don't want to try to "stretch/press" the decal into the corner if both sides are already stuck because it almost always pulls away after a while.  Decals don't like to stretch.  The decal should be pressed into the corner first so it remains "relaxed", and then both sides can be stuck down after that.
  8. Outside corners and sharp edges:  A hair dryer on medium can help decals stick better on outside (and inside) corners or compound bends and short or sharp edges.

Note: The soapy water does not make the decal stick any less than it would have if it was applied dry.   All of my cars built since I learned about this method have had their decals applied in this manner and no decals have lifted or become unstuck, even the models built over 10 years ago.  I actually don't mind applying decals because of this method.  Previously, I hated applying decals because they never stuck to the exact spot I wanted or were slightly misaligned.  No more.  Perfect every time.  It just takes some patience and time.

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Hi guys - lets cut out the 'testing the bad word filters' please. None of them are perfect, but there is a reason they are there and I'm happy to live with occasional false red flags.

Cheers

Chris

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I have a Sand Scorcher body waiting to be masked and painted. It's been years now....

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I also use the above mentioned method of applying decals with Windex instead of soapy water though. 

Has always worked fine with one exception, maybe Kyosho decals are different but I have air bubbles which never came out. Maybe my next Optima shell will come out better. I have been making a habit of ordering a spare shell and decals for my fav kits so I can run em and not have to hunt down a replacement in however many years before I refresh it.

Meanwhile the Blackfoot which has much more  and bigger decals came out fine as of most recent.

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i hate to paint the 1/14 truck and trailer even in my case it is just one colour but it their is a lot to do when useing rattle cans and the pearls i use and concidering on how many pieces need to be done and trying to get the match also. my grand hauler came a cropper when the paint on the shell and wheel fenders cracked and i ended up buying all new witch  cost me nearly £90.

as for the poly shells i dont really enjoy the masking when i make a intricate design 

my worst for decals was my yokomo drift shell it took me 3 hours to cut the decals out and they was layered on top of each other that was my nightmare one for me

Image result for yokomo drift

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Just a point of order. its stickers were talking about not decals. Decals are water slide transfers and are in fact far easier to apply as various solutions are available to make them shrink/mould to shape. They are ok for hrd bodies with a coat of laquer but I would imagine they might crack on polycarbonate. Stickers on the other had should be applied as above, especially the warm water/soap trick. For true scale appearence they are not so good as they are quite thick and they are not as easy to weather if thats your bag!

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Painting bodies can be daunting but practice makes perfect.  Try painting inexpensive bodies. I have a bunch of worthlessness 1/10 pan car bodies I try out color combos on

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5 hours ago, Problemchild said:

However, the use of the word decal is now also used to describe a vinyl sticker also 

 

true, however the reason I pointed out the difference is that a while ago a new member posted a panic message explaining how he was having difficulty in soaking his decals in water to get the backing to slide off and the using microset/sol to bed them down. He had been watching a Youtube demo on how to apply decals and did not realise that most RC cars in fact use stickers.

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About ready to paint my Blitzer Beetle and admittedly I'm not very good at the task.  The prep work of removing flashing, getting the tail light buckets in (and cutting off the ends to glue on clear lenses later), sunroof is already a tall order.  Then there's the paint itself..  so many curves to navigate without creating runs.  If that goes well, then there's the "pleasure" of masking and painting the window trim and side molding.  By this time, adding decals would be a blessing.  

I kidd..  slightly.  I did a Monster Beetle body and after all of the aforementioned steps things turned out okay.  This time, I'm using what I've learned from the previous efforts and so far things are going well.  I used a soft wire brush on my mini-rotary tool to clear most of the flashing, then #1500 paper to smooth things to a shine.  Tail light buckets were screwed on, then sealed from underneath with CA glue.  Afterwards, I used a cutoff wheel to remove the "tail lights" from the light buckets and cleaned all lines up to mate with the clear lenses.  Went over everything with a green scrubbing pad and washing detergent to remove all mold release and let it air dry.

 

I plan on doing a two-color paint job, (grey primer.. then complete body in pearl white with lime green added on the top of the shell and faded in to mid-window line) and then will apply the Blitzer Beetle decals after that.  Hopefully all goes well.

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