[sdiy] Schaeffer Apparatebau question

[Glen]

At 02:42 PM 5/27/03 , René Schmitz wrote:
>Hi Jürgen,
>
>For what its worth:
>Laying out engravings with color isn't so hard to do. A former 
>colleague, who previously worked for a company which made custom panels 
>for traffic control systems, explained it to me once. You simply put the 
>color onto the panel and then wipe off the rest with a cloth soaked with 
>paint solvent. I guess you must work pretty quick to avoid that the 
>paint becomes dry prematurely.
>
>Cheers,
>  René

That's how I put red letters into the shifter knob of a sporty red car I
used to own. I also put some red letters into the name recessed in the
bezel around my car stereo. I simply applied a liberal amount of red car
paint (the very same shade of red paint we painted the car with) to both
objects using a rag. I then immediately wiped each object off with another
rag drenched in paint thinner. I was liberal in the amounts of paint and
thinner I applied to each rag. It seemed counter-intuitive to me, but the
results were actually neater if I kept the object very "wet" (with either
paint or thinner) during the whole process. I had problems with streaking
if things got too dry.

I was surprised how well it worked, but I would advise someone to practice
on something non-critical before working on an important synth panel. If
you don't use the right amount of thinner, or apply the appropriate amount
of pressure to the rag drenched in thinner, you can potentially leave messy
streaks of paint scattered across the object in question. You could also
remove too much paint, and actually remove some of the lettering you were
trying to apply. The speed with which wipe the object is another factor. In
any case, you could simply apply more paint and try wiping off the excess
paint again. 

I hope it's obvious to everyone on the list that this technique isn't
recommended for panels that are already painted, but for things like bare
aluminum, stainless steel, certain plastics (if you work quickly), glass,
rubber, etc.

I got my inspiration from a video tape showing a worker applying colored
lettering to draw knobs that would be used on a Rodgers organ. The parts in
question have lettering carved into plastic knobs, and this gentleman was
simply wiping on pigment, and then wiping off the excess. It looked so
simple, I just had to try it myself.


later,
Glen Berry