Global Scale Modeller

Howdy,

I have recently finished painting some of my models. As this was a two colour camo (grey bottom, green top) I masked the bottom part with Tamiya paints.
When I removed them after painting I found some nasty suprise - the mask left markings that looked like if the sticky substance was left on surface of paint (in fact - the marks are not sticky). They're clearly visible and I would like to remove them prior to putting protective gloss for decals. As you may have guessed - I want to harmlessly to paint remove these markings. So the questions are:

I plan to use the windows cleaner (similar to Windex I believe). Is it a good idea ? Will it interfere with paint ? Or maybe I should do something else?

I will really appreciate any help how not to spoil my hard work

Cheers,
Radek

PS. I masked the paints ~24hours after painting - so the grey paint was (should be) properly dried and settled.

Hmm, I would be careful with the window cleaner, I know people use that to clean airbrushes, so you could risk rubbing off some paint with that. You want a gentle solvent of some kind, which is going to be hard to use without losing some paint.

Without sounding obvious some warm soapy water might work. Add some to the area with a cotton bud and let it sit for few mins before gently rubbing?

Micro sol or Micro set might also work?

Oh, soapy water sounds good suggestion!

This Micro fluids may leave some matt markings, so I will try to avoid them...

Thanks, Gav.

A photo would have been nice !

It could be that you put your masks over a NONE cured paint and you trapped
some VOC Degassing is very important !

Curing time is different from Drying time !
if you trapped gasses under the mask ? and I am speculating here

You might want to leave your model alone for a few days and see if anything
changes ?

How Old was your Tamiya Masking Tape ?

If your tape was Old? and the Adhesive was decaying...?
it might be a culprit as well ?

once again... all speculations !

Using Windex would have Re-activated your paint and would have Removed it from the model...
using Water ! would reactivate your paint and damage it somewhat !
Using soapy water... same results...

if YOU have been using ENAMELS..? which we don't know! then...
its a different story !

Plz tell us More my friend so we can try to help you !

Norm.

AYE, AYE, Sir

I hope I cought the effects right on camera:



Now to the other details:

1) Paint was Gunze Sangyo Aqueous (so acrylic), thinned with Mr Hobby Color Thinner 1:1;
2) As I said - the drying time was ~24h but it could be even more. Now the model rested for 2 days after masks were removed. Effect is just as it was, no changes.
3) I bought Tamiya tape ~March/April this yr, so that gives it probably ~3months more.

Cheers,
Radek

since you say you have used Acrylics... for colours ...

have you tried a Varsol or Paint Thinner for enamels ? maybe a white spirit ?

I say try... on a Q-Tip and very dry at first to see if the glue ? if glue that is... will go away ?

Be gentle! Your paint might loose some Sheen in the process but if the glue goes away!
maybe a shot of Clear might restore your Sheen then.. keep going as usual !

Not sure what it is...???

I might suggest getting some super fine sand paper and try to buff it out. I also read somewhere when I was dealing with my corsair damage that an old t-shirt works well for a buffing cloth. I tried it out and it seemed to work well. Maybe that would help?

How long were the masks left on the plane?

Masks were left about 3-4 hours until I was sure I wouldn't damage top paint.

I will give the enamels a try in the afternoon. Have also some turpentine which seems less reactive and doesn't give that matty surface white spirits do.

Cheers,
Radek

Tamiya masking tape is good stuff but sometimes depending on the surface it goes down on it can be a bit too tacky and leave a little residue, if I think this might happen I'll lay the strips of Tamiya masking tape out on clean plastic card and then peel off, its still plenty sticky enough after that in my experience.

I had this exact issue not too long ago after leaving some low tack frog tape (similar to tamiya tape) on a finished paint and gloss job for days. I had to wetsand it out, reclear, and rebuff the whole car.

Even after it was all polished up again, I masked off the car to paint the window trim and small amounts of residue still remained after only a couple of minutes. I used Turtle Wax scratch remover to level out the residue but it also ate away the window trim paint(but not the clearcoat underneath). If you think the paint is thick enough, I'd definitely suggest getting some scratch remover and try that out. I was working on a 100% cured clear coat, so I'm not sure if that'd change the results.

Another note, Windex did little to remove the residue. Again, I was working on a cured and hardened surface so it didn't eat away any clear coat or leave any stains.