Cleaning the press
Business has been extremely slow lately, so I’ve decided it would be a great time to clean the presses. After cleaning, I got to looking at all the debossed metal labels and how the paint has disappeared. I’m sure this has been discussed before but is there an easy way to repaint these labels? I thought about flooding the area with metal paint and then scraping off the excess. Does that sound like a good idea?
I thought about using ink (hehe) but I don’t think it would last long.
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Steve Alt from Liberty Press might weigh in here but I think he has a system of using automotive paint, spraying the whole area and then wiping off the raised part. I’m not sure how well it would work when the deboss is as shallow as this is… but I’ve seen it done on typecase pulls and the results are excellent.
Bradley.
My recommendation is to get some black automotive lacquer, Q-tips, and some wipes like PIG or some chamois type cloth.
Tap the lacquer into the numbers liberally with a Qtip swab, and then lightly wipe the top surface before it dries.
The paint will last a long time before it wears out from press wash.
Assuming the M/c. base colour is probably Black or at least a dark(er) colour, perhaps try this method, - in order, mask the surrounding area with P.V.C. tape and judicious use of scalpel, scrub the relief area with tooth brush and Ladies Nail Varnish remover, (hence the masking)!
With tiny pot of *Humbrol* Enamel, either Ferrari Red or British racing Green, or U.S. equivalent, Stipple Not paint? into the recessed area,s (even up to the surface to view) enamel dries quickly, even replicating the *GRAVURE, process and then block/buff the end result down with ordinary liquid metal polish and length of wooden reglet, with a little time, care, and effort, the result can end up looking like an Original Enamelled Plaque.
*New to the Art,! devotees, perhaps check out - Gravure - it is part of our heritage.