This is too much fun - Vinyl wrap stuff

[John EH]

Was lurking around the site and found a post where a guy showed how bottlecaps fit perfectly on the black kit volume control knobs.

Well I took it a step further with my vinyl cutter for my Crack project.

[Grainger49]

John, 

How do you get the vinyl to wrap around the round edges so well?  And how do you cut the circle perfectly?

[John EH]

John, 

How do you get the vinyl to wrap around the round edges so well?  And how do you cut the circle perfectly?

Grainger,

I've got a Roland GX-24 Vinyl Cutter.  Basically you just design a graphic which in this case was a 1 inch circle and 1 word with a Coca-Cola font.  The cutter just cuts the lines out perfectly as per the graphic file.

A toy no man should be without.

John

[John EH]

Looks like this.

[Grainger49]

Then how do you get it wrapped around the curve from the top to the sides so well?

[John EH]

The 1 inch circle is red and doesn't really extend down the sides.  The black under the red is the original bottlecap (Asahi Beer).

I may make the circle 1.125 and see if I can cover the black. 

The vinyl is big time flexible.  They wrap cars, and buses, and boats and every thing else under the sun.

In this case it's just kind of laying on top.

[Grainger49]

Very cool!  Thanks for the explanation. 

I didn't know if it was the same thing that they use on cars or not.  I have seen some guys do this online.  I don't know how good it looks in person.

[John EH]

Very cool!  Thanks for the explanation. 

I didn't know if it was the same thing that they use on cars or not.  I have seen some guys do this online.  I don't know how good it looks in person.

You see it everyday all over the place.  Some airplanes are done in it as well. It looks as good as paint when done right with high quality vinyl.  There in lies the rub.  You have to have good stuff.  I buy exterior 5 or 7 year vinyl most of the time. You can buy real cheap stuff as well.  Exterior vinyl indoors on an amp should basically look good for my lifetime and beyond.

Of course I haven't put it on yet and I don't know how clean the cuts are going to look especially around the vent holes.

Probably what I'll try to do is to scan the chassis plate and then trace the scan to make my own vector graphic of the chassis plate.  Then cut out the lettering agin and apply it after the fact.

That way I can get perfect cuts around the vent holes.  Everything else you just poke a hole in and push the plug or connector through.

[Grainger49]

IIRC Kimberly-Clark made the substrate material some years ago.  They sold off (divested) that company because it also made "tobacco products."  That was "reconstituted tobacco."  I worked for K-C for 15 years, retired and am being paid too much as a temp for them now.

I know one guy who put Monte Carlo stripes (like the Shelby Cobra {not a Mustang!}) on his S2000.  I'd like that for mine.

[Doc B.]

Thought you guys might get a kick out of this. I'm building a motorcycle and have been trying different types of vinyl wrap out on various items before embarking upon wrapping all of the plastics on the bike. This one has floated to the top, an interesting carbon fiber look.

Post