Model Railroading > Decaling Issue - need Help

I have been applying decals for well over 30 years with good results.  Recently went to work on a Southern Railroad of New Jersey F7 & GP9 for a friend.  Working with the Microscale system.  The decals are not responding to the setting solutions.  The Micro Set & Micro Sol have little effect.  Even Walthers Solvaset is not softening the decals & having them snuggle into place.  My question is... can the setting solutions go bad?  Can they lose their potency over time?   The bottles I have are old - probably 20 years old or so.  Or... did Microscale change their decal production parameters.  I just can't figure this one out.  The decals don't even adhere -once dry they just slide right off.  Hopefully someone has an answer.
Jeff

Yes they can go bad. The Microscale solutions seem to have a "shelf life" of about 3 years.

Seems like I remember a while back that Microscale had a batch of decals with a manufacturing error. I'd give them a call or email. It doesn't sound like you have a setting solution problem, rather a decal film/adhesive problem.

Rick Bacon
Windsor, CO

I have had quite a number of Microscale decals fail out of the package, including brand new recent stuff.   Its almost as if there is no glue to them.  

Decals should stick, setting solution or no.  They look much better with the solution applied, but should
stick regardless.  I think the decal is the problem, not the setting solution.

I too have been custom painting for about 40 years and used Microscale decals almost exclusively. In talking to Microscale about what you're talking about they explained that since they put the white trap under the colored decal to keep the color the same regardless of what color the decal is applied to the decals are thicker and therefore do not seem to settle and snuggle over and into the details of the models. I found this white trap helpful in applying red stripes on Union Pacific locomotives and passenger cars but the stripes would no longer soften around the details or make nice smooth bends around corners. In fact a lot of times the decal stripes would break going around the corners before bending. Like you I don't like it as it makes decaling much harder to do a good job, but at least the colors of the decals look better with the white trap behind them...