Painting / printing lettering onto cards for WW1 5/17 compasses. Any suggestions?

or ask

http://www.sirs.co.uk/aircraft/support_and_spares

once the decal is on you just spray it with flat acrylic Varnish, that seals it or should, the painters here have varnish in a tin with ball sponge in that they use to seal all the aircraft external decals, they stay put, often the edge is the only thing left. thing to do is make several samples and then immerse and see what happens

Hi Guy’s.

Many thanks for your suggestions.

I don’t believe that it would be possible to apply transfers, mainly due to the fact that the finished cards will be immersed in alcohol.
One of my ideas was to have painting masks/stencils made “similar to the ones use to paint models”, these are then tempararely applied to the cards, which would then be painted, using an alcohol proof paint.
I have also looked into having the cards printed flat, that in itself is not a problem, it’s the shaping after they have been printed, thats where the possible problems lie “scraped/damaged markings”. It wouldn’t be too bad, but the cost of having the printing set up done etc is not cheap, & if it didn’t work, then it would mean a lot of money being thrown away.

Cheer’s.
Bob T.

I fold.

I’ll see your ‘Letraset happy days’ and raise you……

…. ‘Cow Gum’ 😮

Raise that to……..

CS10

May I suggest Chemical etch printing as used for the old cockpit placarding. As the correct compass fluid is alchohol based it would have, as aircraftclocks has said above, a detrimental effect on most adhesives. (I often use straight Vodka to refill compass bowls)

Surely stick on options is not the way to go, as if the compass is to be filled with alcohol this would affect adhesion.

Ooh happy days I …

I’ll see your ‘Letraset happy days’ and raise you……

…. ‘Cow Gum’ 😮

Now I have seen it decal it, I do modelling and print my own, luckily I have a printer that does white, but in this case it is not a problem as you can get decal paper in white, you can lay some paper or card in scan it adjust it in photoshop etc to size add the print and print out a decal, then cut and install it, it is a waterside as said so once on you will need to varnish it to protect it if in fluid.

The decal sheet come in different versions, from laser printer to inkjet paper, a laser is probably better for you?

See link for details

http://www.bare-metal.com/Experts-Choice-Decal-Film.html

http://www.romseymodellers.co.uk/tips/decal-making

This is one of my decal sheets I am working on…

http://i536.photobucket.com/albums/ff321/taylortony/modelling/Chinooktestshotupdateweb.jpg

http://i536.photobucket.com/albums/ff321/taylortony/modelling/Chinookupdatespoiled.jpg

Letraset

Ooh happy days I think I dumped around 2000 sheets of the stuff back in the day. The memory of trying to bodge letters when you ran out of a particular one

Is Letraset even made still?

We stopped using it in the studio back in the 1980s

I assumed it had gone the way of Polaroid films et al

Moggy

This is not that difficult, just time-consuming and would require a certain amount of trial and error work to get absolutely right.

The shape is a truncated cone – which can be calculated and then extrapolated on to a flat sheet.

This then can be laid out with the correct distortion already built in in something like full PhotoShop with a register line marked just above and just below what is needed to aid location.

The actual calculations are relatively simple – it’s the circumference of two circles – the top and the bottom. These values = let us call CT and CB, which is pi x diameter. each calculation gives the length of the top and bottom line. the separation of each line is easily calculated/measured.

For layout, if you put CT/2 and CB/2 on a common vertical line therefore dividing the length differences in half. The compass points can then be laid out from there.

Then print with slightly oversize register lines to aid location, apply and trim excess material.

It’s not easy, but I would even think about Letraset that will just crumble/flake

I’d be trying to find a source of Letraset transfers of the right size and font.

I was more thinking of printing flat on a sheet of plasticised stock, cutting out and then mounting onto the finished metal shape. Just like car bodywork stickers, the curvature won’t affect the ink.

Moggy

I think Guy Black at Aerovintage has tackled this problem. I am sure I saw restored versions of these in his workshops a while back.

I have spoken to Guy about this, & he says he can’t get them printed either, he might have gone down the route of having his ones, hand painted.

I have had a few ideas myself, but I am waiting to hear back from the various companies to see if they can do it.

The one problem with getting them printed whilst flat, is the possible damage to the print/paint when they are pressed/spun.

Cheer’s.
Bob T

I think Guy Black at Aerovintage has tackled this problem. I am sure I saw restored versions of these in his workshops a while back.

But surely that shape can be opened out flat for printing?

Moggy

Hi guy’s
The problem with screen printers these days, is that they seem to only print onto flat surfaces, & as you can see from these photo’s of 5/17 compass cards, they are tapered like the bottom of a cone.

Cheer’s.

Bob T.

printing methods

There are many way to print onto objects as Moggy has said screen printing is one. Are the cards you want to print flat (no edges sticking up) are teh cards black or white some methods of print use non opaque inks. You may be able to create transfers which are quite cheap to produce and float them onto the face bit like an airfix kit. Other methods include pad printing this uses a rubber pad which picks up the ink bit like a rubber stamp, digitally or possibly printing onto a clear vinyl carrier and stick them on OK for bespoke jobs.

Some printers you could get would print on CD’s, would that work?