Hello All

I am Calling all cars here. The build of my life was going amazing and I sprayed my flat coat(Tamiya Flat Clear Rattle Can). And left it to dry all day, and I go to pack it up for local club meeting and my paint job is wrecked and the decal warped and looks like a child painted it on. It's from basically from back of the 4 to the front of the A, please help me to fix this. This was a gift for a good friend of mine. Eagerly awaiting your replies.






Euge

The best thing to do would be to very carefully sand off the wrecked decals, repair any damage to the paintwork and redo the decals. You may need to sacrifice another decal sheet to get correct replacements. Next time put a barrier coat between the decals and the final finish. Future or clear acrylic work well since they don't have any solvents in them which attack decals.

Jessie

What's up sister long time no Talk! Hope you are well. So I had a second gloss down over decals and weathering. Before the flat coat.

Eugene - Heartbreaking, I know . I'm guessing the Tamiya flat coat from the rattle can is lacquer based while the previous decal overcoat was something else- acrylic or enamel based ? While I have used Laquer based flat coat ( Testors Dulcoat) over acrylic , it must always be built up with light dusting coats - too much and the solvents do what they do - desolve. My suggestion is do as Jessica recommended bit stick with all one type of coating . Good luck and keep us posted as to the results of your repair - Richard

It was Mr Hobby Gloss Coat. Then decals. Micro Sol/Micro set, AK panel and pin wash, 2nd gloss coat. All this over prob 5 days. Then yesterday morning sprayed the Tamiya Flat Clear. And let it dry for like 9 hours in the house till I saw the damage. I guess I have to figure out what gloss coats and flat coats are I thought they were all the same. I'm guessing I should use Airbrush to spray vs the rattle cans. And I did a couple passes but maybe I was 2 close or not let first coat dry enough. What are some good Gloss and flat coats to use ??


PS- Paint was Tamiya spray can
AS-6 USAAF OD -Top
And model master acryillic Neutral Gray -Bottom
Stripes. Mr-Hobby white primer and Model Master Flat Black

Eugene,
So sorry to see this. Both Tamiya and Testors/Model Master clears are lacquer based not acrylic based. As Richard said too much to quickly and it will eat right through paint, decals, everything down to the bare plastic. It's what lacquers do.

I've been using Testors Dullcoat and Glosscoat for more then 40 years, tried other brands/types and still went back to them. But I've never applied them with a rattle can, just with a air brush. The problem you had is that the rattle cans put out way to much material, way to fast, and you get a heavy build up which will eat through everything. It can even damage the raw plastic. If you must use a can, then quick lite coats, but give each coat a min of 10-15 min to set up. If you have a air brush, then use it.

As for using Future/Pledge as a barrier coat, with the amount of Matt you applied, it would eat right through it as well.

there is unfortunately no quick easy fix. My guess is that you're going to have to completely strip down the P-51D to raw plastic, fix any plastic issues, the a re-paint and re-decal.

Joel

Thank you All that is what I figure. Just bummer it was my best work. So far.

Eugene,

Your best work is always the next model to make it to your bench.

Please keep us up to date on your fix.

Joel

Eugene,
I use Future for all my clear coats both gloss and flat for flat I mix in Tamiya flat base till I get the sheen I am after, the best part I don't have to worry about damaging the finish!

Cheers Rob.

PS sorry this happened.

Rob,
All model finishes applied correctly are worry free. Even Future/Pledge will run if you apply to much to quickly.
Joel

Maybe it's salvageable. I dunno. I will tell you that I tried to build this very A/C decades ago when the only kit available worth the effort was the old Monogram P-51D.

I was building a version of the A/C without the tail fillet, and was amazed to do some research today and see some pics of the A/C WITH the tail fillet. Since I had removed the fillet from my build, and was doing a small "correction" that ruined it, I feel your pain. Some contend that the fillet-less A/C existed, and the fillet was a retrofit. If I had only known back then!!

Good luck with the repair, but if you fail, understand this: every failure is a learning experience. If you reach a point of diminishing returns with the repair, and never think you're going to recover, START OVER, but harvest as much of this as you can in piece parts. I think you would be surprised how much you could use in parts the second time around.

Anyway, this happens to ALL of us.

Build on!

Hey Brian

Yeah there was actually 5 Passion Wagons. MAJ. A Roberson flew the B when they first received them from RAF then the First -5 without Fillet then CAPT.Weaver got her a flew the -5 then was retroed with the Fillet a flew for awhile and the flew a -15 then it was shortly transferred to another squadron,d during this time late 44' they were receiving the -20/-25 D's along with a changing of the original paintscheme to the overall metal, he was assigned 2 more A/C and I belive his 2nd to last kill was a ME-262. I'll look it to confirm but I remember I was reading about the 339th beating down some 262's and pushed them into the 357th who were on one of the flanks to 339th who were flying close escort to the bombers.

Thank you all for all the help. I am gonna mask the tail and try a strip down if that doesn't work in going start over. Thanks again I'll keep you all posted. Probably do a recovery post in the forum

quoting. words to live by.