Thursday, December 1, 2016

Pink Max Decal Fix, Part 1

I liked most all the Hello Kitty decals on the normal BT-60 based Pink Max rocket.

Well, except for the iron cross and the "kills" decal. Compared to the standard Red Max model they were small.
Big clunky decals were part of the Red Max rockets charm. I wanted these larger to match the size of the visual weight of the Red Max fin decals.

First, Scotch tape was tried to remove the decals. The transfer of the Excelsior (Sandman) decals was strong, they wouldn't budge. Next I tried Windex and they still didn't release. Finally I tried to lift a corner and peel them off, but no luck.

I ended up scraping the decals off with the rounded blade of my Swiss Army knife. Using a rounded blade prevents a sharp tip from scarring the paint.



Some of the remaining adhesive was removed with Goo Gone.
Go light with this cleaner, it can take off the paint too!

The decals were cleaned up using Corel Draw and printed on Bel Paper.
Three spray coats of UV resistant Clear Krylon acrylic were sprayed and allowed to thoroughly dry.


2 comments:

  1. I remember reading somewhere (probably one of the rocketry forums) that Micro Set was a good decal remover. So I checked my bottle and sure enough, there are directions on how to use it as a decal remover. However, it doesn't work on overcoated decals.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi BAR,
      I have used the Micro-Sol products before but I always feel funny paying that much for such a small bottle. Their products do have a place though.
      I've removed decals before with tape but these were stuck! I didn't have much of a choice except to scrape them off.

      Delete