is back from Council of Five Nations.
Decals for each aircraft are clearly marked on the decal sheet. The aircraft name, bombing group "8-Ball" and markings for both sides of the rudders are grouped together. The decals are printed with the carrier film close to the printed image, so one only has to cut the decal from the sheet - without having to cut along the printed edge. The registration is extremely tight, so there aren't overlapping colors or white gaps between colors. There is a layer of white printed under each decal, so that colors remain bright even when placed over dark paint.
The decals go on smoothly, and I use the Micro Set/Micro Sol combination to get the decals to snug down. It is here that I run into another snafu (appropriately enough, on SNAFU) as the Micro Sol - which is supposed to soften the decal - actually distorts a couple of very small images.
NUTS!!!!
After soaking off the ruined decals - the Micro Sol does a really good job of making sure they don't want to leave - I replace the tail codes with another set from the sheet. Then it's on to the national insignia.
In part because it's difficult to get perfect registration on very small lines, and to also provide the maximum flexibility on a single decal sheet, Norm has provided the yellow surrounds used in 1943 as a separate decal. On the real marking, the yellow line is supposed to be 2" thick. In 1/300, you can imagine how small that gets. If one is going to use the yellow surround, then the yellow-outlined white circle is applied first. In the case of the B24, it is a 45" circle for the wings and 65" diameter roundels for the fuselage.
Once the white discs have dried, it's time to lay the stars with blue backgrounds into place. I'm using the faded blue insignia to again represent the aircraft during their time in the desert. The yellow band is thick enough that the star can be laid into the space without white showing between it and the yellow.
