jplacy

Okay, here's the goofy question of the day: I'm trying to come up with a way to take digital artwork, such as a downloaded image off the web, and transfer it to my plane for nose art.

One idea is to print the artwork on an iron-iron sheet that you can run thru a inkjet printer. Hewlett Packard makes such a product. Some problems come to mind right away; for one, I don't know if it would even stick to a fiberglass cowl; it probably won't stand up to fuel, and it definitely won't be UV resistant.

Can anybody suggest a better solution? (other than getting out some paintbrushes and excercising talent I don't have!)

Damnathius

I like the idea. My wife has some of that iron on stuff for the printer. I bet it will work well on fabric covering, and I think I'll experiment. I have one, soon to be 2 biplanes covered in fabric. As for fuel proofing, I think clear dope would work.

I think I'll try it out on some scrap!

LesUyeda

I think that the heat necessary to transfer would fry any finish that you try to put it on. Micro Mark sells water transfer decal paper that works just fine.

Les

jplacy

What kind of luck have you had with the slide-on decals? How do they stand up to heat, sun, fuel, etc.? ... and oh, crashes too! [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-wink.gif[/img]

Damnathius

Yeah, maybe I'll try the water transfer method. I just don't like how stick-ons don't conform to curves such as over ribs, etc.

When I was into Model railroading, I used this decal solvent by Micro Scale that was excellent for making the decal conform to rivets and panel lines on locomotives. It was great stuff. What it would do is soften the decal, often causing it to wrinkle up, but as it dried it would settle down over the surface to the point that with a light application of clear, you could not tell there was a decal there. This might be of use for fabric covered planes, which is another of the reasons I don't want to use stick-ons as they hide the fabric detail.

As for fuel proofing, perhaps a light application of clear poly-U or dope would work.

LesUyeda

I have used butyrate dope as the "spray on after printing", and then sprayed a coat on after application. They are not going to stand up under crashes. All that is holding them together is the clear coat. They will shatter.

Les

Heavy Date

I have been making my own decals for about 6 months now. I use an ALPs printer as it will print white, and the inks are waterproof. I print on clear decal paper and after the decal is applied I wait a couple of days for it to really get set and spay some clear over it to fuel proof it.

All my decals are made using Corel Draw as it is a vector program. Raster images will not print out as sharp and look pretty bad on the model if you try to enlarge or shrink them.
If you get good fresh decal paper, it will mold itself around panel lines and rivets very well and will look like paint when finished.
Hans