finally, a real update on my rally restoration!!!
unfortunately, rich never came around with the silkscreening of the panel (and i probably have not pushed him hard enough because he's got so many projects he's working on), therefore i decided to go another route (for now). when etienne announced that he was going to do a new run of his aluminium stickers, he kindly offered to print the control panel text on alu as well - which i happily accepted.
today, something promising showed up at my doorstep
but i was only happy for a few second until i saw this
let's open it up and see if the alu pieces have been damaged as well
DANG!!!
similar damage to the coin insert stickers
fotunately, etienne had also printed a spare set for me which allowed me to practice a little bit. i've never worked with alu stickers of that size before and believe me, you have to be VERY careful, otherwise they are going to wrinkle quickly and you'll see every single dent / scratch immediately, so let's be extremely precautious here!
because the aluminium stickers are not transparent (and therefore difficult to align) and because the holes are not pre-cut, the first order of business is to hand-cut out the squares where the control panel bolts will eventually go through
with the squares "opened", i can now align the piece of metal with the aluminium sticker from the back
i like where this is going
! note that i've asked etienne to change the "25C" text to "TOKEN" because i'll be using my tokens to credit the game, not quarters!
this was just the warm up, now on to the control panel itself: protective backing removed, squares cut out - waiting for the metal piece
only a few more holes to cut ...
... and we're done!
looks like we have a winner!!!
and what about that bend i showed you earlier in the corner? almost invisible, i can totally live with that!!!
i can't thank etienne enough for vectoring, adjusting and printing the overlay for me - hell of a job, my friend! i'm thinking of either spraying a protective film on top of the overlay OR a second layer of transparent vinyl on top, but i'll have to do some testing first, don't want to ruin the amazing result i have so far!
