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Hi all,

I recently bought a set of GW decals for the RG and started applying them two days ago. My models had been treated to a coat of satin varnish, then I applied the decals and coverd them with a copious amount of micro-sol afterwards. However, I still got a huge amount of silvering . So much so in fact that in my frustration I just scraped them off with my finger. Coming from historical military modeling, a satin coat and micro sol is usually enough to do the trick, but here apparently not so. So for my next try I`ll be repainting, recoating properly and going micro-set first, micro-sol after but I`m not even sure if that is enough.

Does anyone know of a good way to avoid the silvering, rather than covering it up with gloss varnish (I don`t like a glossy look on my models, apart from the eyes). Are FW decals worth the effort? How do they compare to GW anyway?

Lemme know what you think

You must gloss to a high shine before applying decals. Microset then microsol work well.

GW decals are fairly thick, so they have a tendency not to conform to complex surfaces. Warm water can help with this a bit, but you can expect to trap a couple of bubbles (use a sharp pin and microsol to deal with these, or overpaint). Expect to do several applications of microsol too, especially on compound curves like marine shoulder pads. Panel lines often benefit from being slit after the decal is initially applied and dried (but before microsol).

Gloss after decalling, then matt down on that.

Do it 'by the numbers' (ie the long method- don't take shortcuts) and you should be fine.

use decal softeners and then just varnish them again when thats dry

Thanks guys, I`ll just do it by the numbers then.

I have just taken to putting small slices in the decal to allow it to conform to say a shoulder pad. It's tedious work. I am also experimenting with micro pens and just drawing my own on the model.