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Wednesday, November 20, 2019

Estes Space Corps Corvette Class, #7281 Build, Part 7, Decals

The Space Corps build just "finished" on the blog was a Pre-Production Sample (P.P.S.) build that went back to Estes without decals. There was a slight mistake in the decals.
I assume - before thousands of kits are made, Estes gets a few P.P.S. kits from China. These are checked before a production order is made.

Estes sent me two more Space Corps Corvette kits to build. These most recent are P.S. or Production Samples. These had the correct decals.
GOTCHA: Be ready - these decals were thin! After setting the decals down on the first build, I sprayed the decal sheet with one coat of clear acrylic to thicken them up slightly.


I wanted to place the lower wrap decal as shown on the face card photo.
GOTCHA: This puts the decal over the low end of the launch lug.

On the left is a practice wrap before soaking the decal.
On the right is after the decal was placed and trimmed with a razor blade.

Between the before and after pictures shown above - 
TIP: I used a wet Q-Tip to work the decal ends into the crux of the launch lug fillet. Before the decal was totally dry, a razor blade was drawn down the fillet line and the overlap removed.
The two low legs of the STAR was centered over a fin, opposite the launch lug on the back.

TIP: Use your aluminum angle to help set the upper wrap in line with the lower wrap already in place.
On the left is the rocket turned upside down. The angle edge is set at the center point.
On the right a pencil line is drawn for centering the upper decal.

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