Ask and you shall receive:That does look good, I can't see the seam at all. I imagined I could see it after the 5th chevron, but it's not there. I'll be curious to see how the side with the lettering looks, so far so good!
Still a bit wet with Micro-sol
So the modified waterslide technique was cribbed from some youtube video. Rather than let the decal soak for the entire duration, I leave it in the water for about 10-15 seconds, and then take it out and lay (lie?) it face down gently on a piece of paper towel. The water soaked into (and still sitting on) the backing paper will continue to work to soften the glue, and eventually it'll be ready for application.
Although I don't think I have it quite nailed down yet (need to go back and watch that video again), it has some significant advantages:
1) You can leave them on the paper towel for a long time, because you don't have to worry about them being over-soaked and coming apart in the water.
2) No losing small decals in the water, because you remove them from the water before they actually become loose.
3) No forgetting the decals in the water and having them come apart before you get back to them, because for the 10-15 seconds in the water you stay with them. I like to pipeline my decals, applying one while soaking the next. Sometimes applying the current decal would take me longer than I expect, then I'd possibly have a situation to deal with in the water. No longer a problem.
Downside is that I think they take longer to soften out of the water than in it.
Anyway, I like it so far.