Lettering Gauge Dials

[nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org]

A month ago I solicited advice from the old geezers and the savants about how to re-letter a restored steam gauge dial.  (This one happened to be a 400# Ashcroft taken off a B&O engine in 1964.)

No one confessed to have undertaken such a project, so I launched forth on my own.  Here's how to do the job...

Go to an arts/crafts store and buy a 2 oz. bottle of the needed flavor of acrylic paint (black or white.)  I used Folk Art's "Outdoor Opaque #1630 Midnight Acrylic Paint."  It cost me $1.49.

Also buy a bottle of acrylic thinner.  Another $1.49.  Cheapskate me, I thought I could thin acrylic with the naptha in lighter fluid, but that doesn't work.  Unless you thin the acrylic paint, it dries so quickly that you don't have time to lay it into the indentions, numbers, graduation marks, etc.

Also buy the tiny'est brush they sell.  (They're called "spotting brushes.")  This is a two-buck investment.

Work under sunlight if possible.  And split the job up into two or three sessions.  You'll be pleased with the result.

-- abramoslav of ruthenia
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