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Question on sun bleaching?


burner12

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If you can simply lay them on a ledge in the sun, you don't really need any plastic or protection. However, if you want to tape them up inside the rear window of your car (for example), put them in a plastic baggie. This will protect the decal paper from the tape, and the decals from any moisture that might also form on the window. After all, you don't want the decals adhered to the window! Hope this helps!

 

P.S.- THANK YOU! You and your dad did yeoman work at Jaxcon yesterday! Without efforts like yours, our show would fall far short of its goals!

 

GIL :smiley16:

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I'd say out of plastic. The less between the decal and the UV rays, the better. Just make sure they stay dry. I did this one time and had them taped to a window. With a weather change the window "sweated" a bit and the decals snuggled down nicely to the window!

 

Timing is hard to tell. Depends on the level of UV, the thickness of any glass between the decal and the sun, etc. etc. Also, if you have replacement windows, they may have UV dampeners in them, so it might not work at all. Just check them every day or so to see how they're doing.

 

I've heard of people putting them under plant grow lights, which are UV sources, and I suppose you could even put them in a tanning bed!

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So it really depends on location? Inside a car have them in plastic ,and inside a house no plastic ? Right now I have them in plastic taped to a window inside my house. So I'll take them out and leave a small gap between the window and decal sheet, so they aren't flat against it.

Edited by burner12
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If they're old enough to have yellowed (and hard to replace) I'd suggest making a color scan of the sheet before you try applying them as insurance against them disintegrating when they hit the water. Once you have an image you (or someone with the right programs/equipment) can adjust the colors and print them on decal paper.

 

Don

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And before you apply them, give them a coat of some sort of "decal saver". After the bleaching, there's a chance you've also "dissolved" the carrier film and/or dried out the decal itself. In either case, it could shatter when put in water or applied to the model. There are some commercially produced products to prevent that, but I find a generous coat of gloss or dull coat works just as well.

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Thanks for the advice. I let them get bleached for 1 day and see a dramatic improvement. I'll do it for another day but after that I think they might be done. But I will coat it and scan it as a back up. And upload a photo

Edited by burner12
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Sounds like good advice.

:smiley29: I have taped decals on the inside of the window that has the most sunlight in my house. The old Forg Wildcat decals was a case in point, 25 years later my model with the sun-exposed decals looks like new.

:blu-plane: But Frog had top quailty varnishes, thanks to Richard Ward of MODELDECAL fame who is now doing the Airfix decals of our day...

I live in Greece, where it is sunny 355 days a year, so sunlight is ample here. In a week the job is done.

I never thought of windows sweat, but Athens has a dry cilmate, but that is an extra precaution I will take in the future. One always learns...

In this case I will stick a thick card frame on the window with tape, leave space, say 3-5 mm, and tape the decal sheet to the four frames of the card frame. to ensure the decals do not contact the window glass. :unsure:

Coating with some acrylic varnish by airbrush can help against possible disintegration, but try it first on unwanted decal sections and see the effect. Varnishes, like colors, are weird and mysterious creatures and with so many brands around they tend to have different properties & effects on decals.

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