[sdiy] DIY Hot Foil Stamping?

[Rob B]

Well, just got this sorta nifty chunk of hot foil, along with a pen
*which is about worthless I might add*. ;)

7.99 at Office Depot

Cool thing about it is, you can make a stamp out of silicone, put
nichrome wire in it to heat it, a thermostat, and do some really neat
labeling with it.

Since hot stamping works great for lettering as far as durability and
such, this may be a good way to go. The heat it needs isn't all that
hot either.

Plus, you can get hot foil sheets very cheap and get them in all sorts
of metallics and shiny colors and the stuff is tough as nails!

Doing some initial experiments now and it seems pretty decent.

Oh, btw: after much trying using a piece of metallic hot foil and a
silicone mold, I have found that it is *impossible* for the original
roland 303/606 knobs to be hot metallic foil. ;) I guess they really
were plated. There is just no other way to do the compound surfaces
around the knob, since the foil won't bunch up in there, and a metal
mold would just tear the foil.

But, for relatively flat front panels and the like, the chrome letters
look pretty kick ass! And it was a bit easier than I expected,
honestly.. I will be posting a few pics of it soon.

Now I am wondering if I could pick up a small machine from ebay or
something.. No luck so far, but I am sure there are a few floating
around somewhere for cheap.

Much less mess than screenprinting, and the finish looks soo good.

Rob


AIM: cybrgzr0 <--- the last thing is a number