I model some pretty obscure railroads and was thrilled when I discovered that Champion decals offered "Tonopah", "Goldfield" and "Tidewater" in their private road name decals. I ordered like 10 sets of each in black, white and gold. I lettered some cars and they worked great. The problem now is that the sets have disappeared. I have a bad feeling that they got tossed inadvertently. Darn it! When I went back to the Champ website, they have gone out of business.
Any suggestions? Is there anyone selling these sets now? Do other companies sell letter sets like these. I've had to do the individual letters to make up Bullfrog Goldfield and it isn't fun. Making decals on my computer hasn't worked. The gold lettering is way to faint. Would a custom decal company make up Railroad roman sets for me without submitting artwork? Thanks in advance - Nevin
Scan the decals using the highest quality setting that your scanner has and print your own decals. That is what I do. It works great and is inexpensive.
NevinWIs there anyone selling these sets now? Do other companies sell letter sets like these. I've had to do the individual letters to make up Bullfrog Goldfield and it isn't fun. Making decals on my computer hasn't worked. The gold lettering is way to faint. Would a custom decal company make up Railroad roman sets for me without submitting artwork?
Most custom decal makers will do the artwork and layout for a fee, but if you require only words, you need specify only the size and font desired, plus your choice of colour(s). The catch is that you'll usually have to order a specified minimum number of sets - I had custom lettering made in dry transfers, and the minimum order was 50 sheets (and I'm well into using the third order ).
One way to save on the costs is to use whatever size of paper that's the decal maker's "standard" size, then fill it with as much lettering as possible, in as many sizes as you might find useful. If you have a friend who also needs similar simple lettering (no heralds or other fancy artwork), you could split each sheet proportional to your needs, and split the cost in the same manner. Usually, the required minimum order is for a single colour, so if you need your lettering in white, black, and gold, you'll need to order the minimum number of sheets in each colour. It's possible to get multi-coloured heralds, too, but that's usually on a separate sheet and will drive up the cost considerably.
Here's a link to a list of decal suppliers:
http://www.google.ca/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=great%20decals!%20decal%20suppliers%20page&source=web&cd=1&ved=0CEsQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.greatdecals.com%2FDecals.html&ei=pbTXTrjAC8Lo0QGu7b3cDQ&usg=AFQjCNEkqbdbap3l8InCCQVDAWB1SZrfxw&cad=rja
If you don't need to letter a lot of equipment, you can use alphabet sets, although they can also be difficult to locate. I lettered perhaps six dozen passenger cars (using dry transfer alphabets) and three dozen diesels (using decal alphabet sets) with the roadname "Elora Gorge & Eastern", and discovered that many un-needed letters can be used to make "G"s when using dry transfers, but not much can be done when you louse-up an ampersand.
Wayne
There are several people / companies out there that do custom decals for reasonable rates. I use DM Decals by Don Manlick in Wisconsin. He offers several "standard" sets where you tell him your railroad name and the font and color you want, and you can get sets that have the railroad name spelled out, initials, and numbers all on one sheet, or RR name, initials, slogan and numbers. You only need to submit artwork if you want a herald, and even there if it's fairly simple the decal maker may well work with you to create what you want.
MR and RMC etc. usually have a couple of ads for decal makers in there.
p.s. Clover House does offer a "Tonopah and Tidewater" dry transfer set, if that helps??
Here's a list of decal suppliers ....
http://www.greatdecals.com/Decals.html
Also note the Yahoo Group link at the top - you may want to consider joining the group and asking for assistance .... I've managed to find some really old and obscure sets through the group !
Mark.
¡ uʍop ǝpısdn sı ǝɹnʇɐuƃıs ʎɯ 'dlǝɥ
You might want to check out this guy who I have found to have a great selection of decals including the Champ brand. His website is www.canadasouthern/tmr/ He is often known as TMR Distributing. Give him a try. He may be able to help you.
Thanks to everyone. I'll be talking to Rail Graphics about line of lettering. - Nevin