Lettering for home-brew front panels

[g7kpm]

Hi,

I am getting close to the last of my letteraset, dry transfer rub on letters which I use for labelling equipment panels. WH Smith no longer appear to stock them, and I can only find the odd online supplier who are asking the earth for partially used rub on letter sets (Its a shame as they always produced professional looking results and were very hard wearing once sealed with clear lacquer paint).

As such, I am looking for alternative ideas so I was wondering what other people use?

Any info or ideas would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Jason - G7KPM

[g4eml]

If you have an inkjet printer you can buy water slide paper and print your own water slide transfers. For small projects you can print the whole panel as one transfer. Clear lacquer can then protect the surface.

Alternatively you can get black letters on clear tape or white letters on clear tape cartridges for label printing machines. By trimming away the excess clear tape you can make quite neat labelling.

Another thing I have done is to print a whole panel on coloured paper, feed it through a laminator and then stick it to the panel with double sided tape. The laminated sheet gives a hard wearing surface.

Colin.

[g8lce]

That sounds a great idea Colin. I think that if the panel was printed on paper then the switch, knob and display holes were cut out with extra room for the laminate to bond together around them this would work really well and easily. I will now have to rethink my rough finished front panels as this would add a finish that would hide any rough bits.
Thanks for the idea.

Martin G8LCE

[g7kpm]

Thanks for the reply Colin, some good ideas there. I'll look at the water slide transfer paper as it sounds like the best solution for me (a lot of what I build is 19" rack format, so a bit too large for a single A4 print front panel).
Looking on the web, there is a lot of choice out there. Any advice upon which brands of paper are the best or are they all fairly comparable with regards to results / finish?

Thanks again,

Jason - G7KPM

[g4eml]

Hi Martin,

I make the paper slightly smaller than the front panel to leave room for the laminate to bond around the edges.
I don’t cut out holes for pots etc. before laminating, I find the washers and nuts cover the edge of the holes and hold the laminate to the panel.
If I have an lcd display I cut a hole in the paper before laminating to leave a clear window.

I print two copies of the front panel. laminate one and use the other as a drilling template for the panel. Temporarily fixing it and drilling through it.

Then attach the laminated version and cut out any holes with a scalpel, using the drilled holes as guides.

The end result can look very good. it also covers up any countersunk screws used for fixing displays etc.

I find that using pale coloured paper gives the best looking results. I tend to use a pale yellow paper with black printing.

It does of course need you to plan your complete panel layout in advance. However if you decide to add an extra control in the future it is fairly easy to remove the laminate and fit a new one.

Double sided carpet tape works well for fixing to the panel.


Jason,

I have only tried one of the water slide papers and I can’t remember the brand. They are available in white or clear, probably clear would be best for most panels.

There are also available what they call dry transfer papers. They are in two parts, a clear sheet which is printed in reverse and a sheet of adhesive which is then laminated over the print. You then cut out the individual transfers. Unlike Letraset there will be a clear border around each label though.

Colin.

[g4hjw]

These days, I do my panel lettering by mirror image printing on hp transparency film (not all brands are as good). Then I spray the lettering/image side with contrasting car paint. Finally, when the spray paint is totally dry, this is covered with double-sided sticky tape. It works very well, though the standard transparency film is glossy. At one time, a customer paid for some work partly in matt transparency film (this is the fens, after all) and that produces a perfect finish - the effect is identical to the finish that you see on some Tektronic instruments. I have since looked for this film on ebay, but have only ever found it available in huge minimum order quantities, and I can't remember the trade name of the material that I was given. It was for use with inkjet printers, btw,

Bernie G4HJW