weathering decals

[Deleted]

I just finished the final weathering stages of a 1:35 german halftrack. I scrubbed the model pre assembly with soapy water dried and build. Next base coated with auto primer which worked well and bonded great to the plastic. I then shot over with Tamiya acrylic panel fading etc. When done, I then was ready for some windsor/newton oil for weathering. I did NOT use a 'clear coat' prior to this and am figuring this is the reason for the following. I did the dot method with some turpentine wet brush and noticed two things happened. One, the 'dots' were difficult to pull down the sides of the model and two, some of the decals bubbled up. Im thinking the reason was no clear coat was used to seal the acrylic underneath prior to oil weathering. Thoughts or tips?? Thanks in advance.

[spud]

yes that was your problem you need a sealer coat, Alot of people use future/Klear before and after the decals till will protect them from lifting.

have the decals come off or just bubbled ?

also your oils didnt move as you would like because of the matt paint being rougher than the gloss. again this is why people use future/klear it helps with this

[406 Silverado]

The decs like Spud mentioned.

The oils also. One thing I do which makes it easier to do the dot, or other streaking, is to pre dampen the area first with thinner.Not too wet, just so it's some what wet. This does two things. first it allows you to manipulate the oils or enamels, and second you have less or no tide marks.
It also would depend on the oils color and how long it is on the model. Always do small sections at a time or the dots will stain and be a pain to remove. Some colors have stronger pigments in them. Blues and reds are the hardest to work with. Think of painting a room in your house blue or red, then try to paint over these colors.

That's my take on it.

[Deleted]

Thanks for the input.....seems to have rectified my issue. I tried both techniques on scrap parts first and worked great. Also limiting the surface area to 1/2 side at a time apppears to work better as well. Thanks again. Most likely more Q's to come.