I want to letter a couple of black locomotives with white or silver Las Vegas & Tonopah RR lettering. Unfortunately the letters were relatively small and along the top edge of the tender. doing it letter by letter seems daunting for that size of lettering. I have from champ letter sets for "Tonopah" and "Tidewater" but they never made Las Vegas and the letters are too big anyway.
I tried on my computer to print out the correct lettering on decal paper using silver or gold color but they turned invisible when applied to the black locomotive. The ink was just too transparent. Any other ideas or thoughts. ALPS printers are long gone correct? - Nevin
Check our custom decal makers, the only way to get white decals. Do a search on the forum and see.
Bob Boudreau
CANADA
Visit my model railroad photography website: http://sites.google.com/site/railphotog/
One option is to paint a white box on the tender, and then to print a white-letters-on-black background decal on clear paper. When you apply the decal over the white box, the white background will show through.
This is not an ideal technique. For one thing, getting a good, true black out of the printer and on to the decal paper is difficult. With my old inkjet, it tends to be more like a dark gray, and a bit mottled at that. If you are planning to weather the tender, though, the seams can be covered over and the decal can be weathered along with the rest of the tender to match pretty closely.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
Hi Bob;
I have followed you around so to speak on forums for several years. Thank you for the information regarding picture taking for this hobby. Right now, while there is a dearth of work here, I am detailing some of my rolling stock, and when completed, would like to do some quality pictures of my work. I have a brand new Nikon, so it should be an intersting endeavour.
Rich
EF3 Yellowjacket
Nevin
Contact me off forum. I can print decals for you in White, Silver and Gold.
Dan
I took a quick picture of a decal I did over the weekend.
This is way back in a dimly-lit corner. But, the photo shows the white-on-black issue I discussed earlier. I painted around the decal with cheap acrylics, and didn't attempt much weathering to hide the letters. As you can see, the unpainted area between the letters doesn't have a good "black" look at all.
This bothers me now. The building isn't finished anyway, but now I'll have to do more touch-up to hide the non-uniform color of that warehouse door.
To everyone: Thank for the suggestions. There are some custom decals makers online that might work. Pike-62. I just tried to send you a message through the "start a conversation" Let me know if you received it.
Does anyone know how to send someone an email with the new software? - Nevin
Well, this is just a guess on my part, because even though it was explained to me the answer was clear as mud.
But, if you want to send a message to someone who has posted on this particular thread, I think you open that post and then select the "start a conversation" button. I believe that a blank page opens up where you can put your message, and the name of the person who wrote the post you are responding to will show up in the receipient box.
I kind of think that they have combined the former send e-mail and sead private message functions into the start a conversation function. I have not yet figured out how the receipient knows or gets notified that he has a message out side of the forum, but maybe that will all get explained in a simplified manner someday.
I used to use an ALPS printer to make my white decals. They quit making them several years ago, but they still show up for sale on eBay. I left the job where the printer was, so not available to me anymore. As I remember, it was a "dye sublimination" printer and we had white cartridges for it. I simply printed the decals out on Micro-mark decal paper. Using solvaset on gloss paint the decal backing totally disapeared. Wish I could still use that printer.
MisterBeasley I took a quick picture of a decal I did over the weekend.
Its nice to encounter a fellow Futurama fan...
John