another spin on painted gauges
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Postmaster
Joined: Mar 2008
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From: Prairieville, La
another spin on painted gauges
I have the xls panels with the aluminum finish and decided to do the gauges in aluminum. I found that the hobby shop sells a fluorescent red paint pen made by testors. This is how it turned out.
before
after
close up
I noticed on the white face gauges that no one painted the all black face panel so I gave it a shot. Please let me know what you think. I will try to get a good overall dash picture to get full perspective.
before
after
close up
I noticed on the white face gauges that no one painted the all black face panel so I gave it a shot. Please let me know what you think. I will try to get a good overall dash picture to get full perspective.
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Postmaster
Joined: Mar 2008
Posts: 3,593
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From: Prairieville, La
I do not know yet I just put them in today. I also forgot that I had a gear selector and need to paint that also. I will try to get a picture tonight.
Senior User
Joined: Dec 2008
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Beautiful!!! I want to do this soooo bad to my gauges, it's just I don't have a big enough set of chick-peas (yet) to paint my gauges. Afraid I will screw it up.
Here is some wildlife supersluth meets painted gauges. Had a problem with packrats stealing sockets and misc. small tools. The fast way to stop that non-sense was to trap them, but that didn't return the already missing tools. So I bought some glow in the dark powder from http://www.unitednuclear.com/glow.htm
spread the powder out on the floor, then when they pranced and danced around in it trying to pick up a small shiney quarter, I could follow their footprints back to their lair and retrieve my tools!!!
Long story short, I thought about getting the liquid form of this paint and doing my needles, numbers and lettering against a white back ground. Who needs the gauge lights if everything is already aglow.
LNF150
Here is some wildlife supersluth meets painted gauges. Had a problem with packrats stealing sockets and misc. small tools. The fast way to stop that non-sense was to trap them, but that didn't return the already missing tools. So I bought some glow in the dark powder from http://www.unitednuclear.com/glow.htm
spread the powder out on the floor, then when they pranced and danced around in it trying to pick up a small shiney quarter, I could follow their footprints back to their lair and retrieve my tools!!!
Long story short, I thought about getting the liquid form of this paint and doing my needles, numbers and lettering against a white back ground. Who needs the gauge lights if everything is already aglow.
LNF150
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From: Kuna ID
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I like the aluminum concept. I actually already tried this on a spare cluster that I had and it got messed up on the last coat. The paint started coming out really splotchy and ruined everything.
The one thing that I don't like about yours are the lettering on the overlay panel and the orange/red lettering "E" and "H". I think it's too much and detracts from the coolness factor. I think they would look better in black.
The one thing that I don't like about yours are the lettering on the overlay panel and the orange/red lettering "E" and "H". I think it's too much and detracts from the coolness factor. I think they would look better in black.
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From: Johnstown, PA
It doesn't look bad - I'd be interested in how they look at night to know if I'd do it or not to a similar set. I echo Stosh's sentiment on the red lettering too...might look better in black.
Tuned
Joined: Aug 2004
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From: Winnipeg Canada
I think all alphanumeric information should carry the same weight and be black with only the needles in red. Perhaps the inside edge of the bezel should be aluminum to soften the angle of the gauge face.
Senior User
Joined: Mar 2009
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From: northern cali
looking nice. i'm naturally inclined to want to add more color too so i get how you went with so much orange...i just painted mine white and kept only the needles orange AND the "55" on the speedo....one of the first rules of design is that emphasizing everything (or lots of things) emphasizes nothing...i'm diggin the silver though! that's a nice twist on the idea.
truthfully, i think i could change up my gauges constantly...just keep picking up sets at the JY and create a new look every few months or so...
truthfully, i think i could change up my gauges constantly...just keep picking up sets at the JY and create a new look every few months or so...
Fleet Mechanic
Joined: May 2009
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looking nice. i'm naturally inclined to want to add more color too so i get how you went with so much orange...i just painted mine white and kept only the needles orange AND the "55" on the speedo....one of the first rules of design is that emphasizing everything (or lots of things) emphasizes nothing...i'm diggin the silver though! that's a nice twist on the idea.
truthfully, i think i could change up my gauges constantly...just keep picking up sets at the JY and create a new look every few months or so...
truthfully, i think i could change up my gauges constantly...just keep picking up sets at the JY and create a new look every few months or so...
2 of my favorite artists, definitely would make for something interesting.
or perhaps make a mix of the two?
http://weblog.tudelft.nl/media/blogs...omposition.jpg
http://www.michaelnewberry.com/av/po...on_pollock.jpg
http://images.ford-trucks.com/forums...ilies2/shy.gif
Senior User
Joined: Mar 2009
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From: northern cali
that would actually be a really cool project <b>jmeyer</b>. Figure out a way to bring in an artistic style (famous or just your own) while still keeping the gauges readable and usable. It would be a real challenge to not sacrifice function for form.
Fleet Mechanic
Joined: May 2009
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IF i ever get out to the junkyard, I might try this myself.
the only real proplem I can see with the JP design, is that since it's splatter paint, there is a good chance of ruining the numbers. so yeah, it will take a while to get it laid out and designed. but when it's done, i think it will be quite amazing.
the only real proplem I can see with the JP design, is that since it's splatter paint, there is a good chance of ruining the numbers. so yeah, it will take a while to get it laid out and designed. but when it's done, i think it will be quite amazing.