Dry transfer question?

There aren't that many made any more for aircraft, although Archer has a very extensive line of dry transfers for Armor. Letraset used to make a huge line of dry transfers for aircraft back in the late 70's, but they are long gone. A new Company has recently introduced a line for AC, but the name escapes me at the moment & I haven't used them yet. They have been reviewed over on the ARC site, so take a look there.

Dry transfers are applied by rubbing them on from a backing sheet. The advantages are that they have no carrier film, don't require a gloss finish & have that truly " painted on " look. Disadvantages are that placement is critical, no second chance once you start rubbing. Also, shelf life is limited compared to water slide decals. When the inks dry out, the transfer becomes difficult. This is what killed the Letraset line. Modelers tend to buy & hoard sheets, so when you try & use them a few years later & they no longer work, it's a problem.

Regards, Rick

thanks for the disertation rick!! it does sound interesting......i'd like to try my hand at it one day. it would seem to be more authenic looking. later.

They are used quite frequently by the model railroad crowd. I have a small stock of pinstripe and lettering transfers on hand.
It's true you have to get them right the first time but it's very easy to apply them as the backing paper is partially opaque allowing you to line them up. I cut out the transfer close to the edge and secure it to the model using low tack tape. A burnishing tool or a blunted pencil works great for burnishing the transfer to the model.

We used to use them a ton for drafting purposes, but I haven't used them on models. As was mentioned once they have aged they get to the point that they just won't stick any longer. I would think that it is also a bit difficult to burnish them properly on compound curved areas. They are sort of waxy and tend to split and break easily.

I have some sheets of letters and numbers that still work sometimes. I picked them up at an art supply store for little or nothing since they were just getting rid of them. The wheel chocks on some of my models have the squadron number and plane number on them that I did with them. These are so old I usually had to do the number several times just to get one to stick.