Loco Nameplate

[Deltic007Participant @deltic007]

[Deltic007Participant @deltic007]

About to attempt a nameplate with 1/2 high letters,plate is straight no issue there, i have seen some cast letters from Reeves and wondered if anyone had used them?? They will make life a lot easier i guess and at £0.96p each they seem good value.

Thanks in advance any tips in this matter welcome.

Deltic 7

[MICHAEL WILLIAMSParticipant @michaelwilliams41215]

Hi Deltic007 ,

Making nameplates using separately attached letters is a bit fiddly at best and the available letters are seldom the right style .

Far better to etch the plate and get a nice crisp and correctly styled result .

Etching your own plates is really easy even by DIY methods and results can be superb .

Regards ,

MikeW

[Deltic007Participant @deltic007]

Where would i start to learn how to do that Mike?

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

Or this nice lady could knock a couple out for you

[SteambuffParticipant @steambuff]

I doubt … This is what her web site currently says :-

We are not presently taking orders for photo-etched plates. Due to circumstances, we are currently able to offer an artwork service only.
If you are interested in purchasing artwork with a view to sourcing your etching elsewhere, please get in touch and we will try to help.
This situation will be reviewed in Spring 2014.

Dave

[Sub MandrelParticipant @submandrel]

Hi Deltic,

I'm hopeful that ME might publish a step by step article of mine on the subject in the new year.

The disc below is about 7/8" diameter.

Neil

[Diane CarneyModerator @dianecarney30678]

Thank you Jason – but as Dave then said, I am afraid I am not taking orders just now (for obvious reasons – not untypically, MHS have had 15 hours of my day so far…) but I will help with advice if I can.

Diane

[John BaguleyParticipant @johnbaguley78655]

Not as good as Dianne's but I've had pretty good results using this method:

**LINK**

John

[Diane CarneyModerator @dianecarney30678]

Those are quite good results. It depends on how deep an etch you need. This method will only tolerate fairly shallow etching which is fine for a small plate like the one illustrated but the resist will break up and cause much frustration if you are trying to achieve a good depth.
The other important factor is the sharpness (resolution) of the positive film 'mask'. A print from an ordinary office printer has its limitations, of course, and when you look at it under a glass you start to understand that you are giving the etchant every opportunity to eat into your nice straight edges from the start.

It's a black art, to be sure!

Diane

[Russell EberhardtParticipant @russelleberhardt48058]

How about using spray on resist as used for pcb prototyping? You could print the artwork on overhead transparency film using a laser printer, touch up if necessary, and expose the resist using sunlight (cheaper than a UV lightbox.

Russell.

[MICHAEL WILLIAMSParticipant @michaelwilliams41215]

Hi Deltic ,

(1) Have a look here :

http://www.chempix.com/

(2) Very high quality nameplates can now be made by machine engraving .

It is possible using the old pantograph engravers but the coming of CNC has made the whole process much simpler .

People on here have shown examples of DIY machine engraved nameplates – I believe that someone – possibly ‘tractionengine42’ – did a super example and perhaps he will describe his methods in detail .

Another way that machine engraving is now easier is in the quality of cutters available . Modern ceramic cutters stay sharp long enough to do an entire plate whereas the older HSS and CS ones had to be changed or sharpened quite often thus causing loss of register and all manner of depth variations and unwanted nicks .

Regards ,

MikeW

Edited By MICHAEL WILLIAMS on 10/12/2013 15:15:12

[Deltic007Participant @deltic007]

Thanks for all the etching info,i still prefer a decent depth to Nameplates so will be going the Reeves route.

[MICHAEL WILLIAMSParticipant @michaelwilliams41215]

Hi Deltic ,

If you are going along the separate letters route then need to devise a way of holding the letters in place while soldering to backplate – it’s very easy to end up with a mixture of letters in a puddle of solder !

If the word being spelt out is short then an aluminium weight may be ok but for longer words it’s a bit of a problem .

Only sugestion I have is to get hold of some HotTape and lay out the letters upside down before sweating the whole lot in one go to backplate .

Purely out of interest

(1) Full size nameplates seldom had deep lettering – typically 3/8 to 1/2 inch thick .

(2) Etching in a more advanced form is used to make engineering components with considerable depth of relief . Normally called Chemical Milling then but essentially the same as etching .

Regards ,

MikeW

Edited By MICHAEL WILLIAMS on 11/12/2013 09:35:33

[NJHParticipant @njh]

I understand Michael's concerns about the difficulties of soldering / sweating . I have no expertise in this field but I do wonder if you could "stick" the letters on? Some of the modern adhesives are very good and will allow a little time to ensure correct positioning.

Norman

[John Stevenson 1Participant @johnstevenson1]

Few answers.

First there is a book, no # 36 in the Workshop practice series on Photo Etching but IMHO the article published in MEW around the #100 mark gave more detail.

 

Someone will come along and give the right issue number.

 

Software has come on in the last few years and now enables very small letters to be done without leaving the radius in the corner so CNC engraving is definitely a go.

 

 

That is 3/4" wide brass, 8" long, note it still has the serif's on the n's, w's and y's.

 

This is a 3" log Ransomes plate I did some while ago.

 

 

This one is a scrapper as I started off in the wrong place and finished up short, it should have holding ears on.

So I just linished it flat, both ends to look OK. The base has had one coat of rattle can black and you can see tooling marks, if it had been enamelled it would look good.

 

The letters could have been sharper but the font chosen was a font to match the original

 

Lastly just as Diane does etched plates a guy called Steve Sparrow over at Steamplates does this sort of work up to full size.

http://www.steamplates.co.uk/

Edited By John Stevenson on 11/12/2013 10:07:35

[Author]

Posts