The decals were one of the big features of the kit - two big sheets. Next to the Citation Patriot, few kits had this many water slide decals.
When the kit first came out, everybody talked about how long it took to apply the decals.
Then they'd talk about how cool the design was.
The canopy decals didn't look like the ones in the decal placement picture. I thought the decal on the left would have to be flipped over to match the shape of the instruction picture.
These would to be cut apart, the clear coat "bridge" on the center decal goes over both sides of the cockpit canopy.
The two triangle pieces are left together and rolled over the high point of the canopy. The rear piece has to be cut an placed separately.
On the right is the canopy decals in place.
On the left you can see the back decal has the raised "point" forward. On the model the flat side goes forward for the best fit.
Luckily the lines on this nose cone decal were the same width. I cut a piece out of the rectangle. Because this decal patch is small, cut enough clear border to help with placement and bonding.
Here's the same decal with the patch in place.
There are so many decals on this rocket nobody will miss the small rounded rectangle on the nose cone side.
Regarding the shape of the canopy decals on the instructions -- probably a perspective effect that is distorting the shapes (i.e. the canopy area is viewed at an angle rather than perpendicular). The inscribed panel lines on the nosecone should give a clearer indication of the shape. Of course, this could lead to a different frustration -- the inscribed shapes and the decals don't match 100% (and likely this will lead to some folks opting to paint the "glass" areas of the canopy rather than use the decals).
ReplyDeleteHi Naoto,
ReplyDeleteI have a feeling the instruction photo might be old, maybe even a pre-production photograph. The panel lines didn't really help with the placement, they didn't really match the decal shape. It confused me!