Goblinz Posted October 18, 2007 Report Share Posted October 18, 2007 Just had a thought on making a low-cost front panal. Was toying with the idea of having a thin piece of perspex with just a piece of paper with the panal printed on mounted behind it, I'm sure this has been documented before on here somewhere, I decided that the perspex would have to be very thick to be strong enough though. I have a friend who works at a printers and does a lot a work printing vinyl, It wouldn't cost much to get the panal printed on self adhesive vinyl (either clear or coloured) which could be stuck to whatever panal you want, care would have to be taken to get rid of bubbles. I won't see my friend for a good couple of months as she is away so can't really experiment with this. Has anybody got any thoughts on this? G Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnnieBee Posted October 18, 2007 Report Share Posted October 18, 2007 Hi GoblinzI have an Epson 4800 inkjet printer and have purchased a roll of self adhesive vinyl for this very purpose. I actually have the front panel design for a Music from Outer Space SoundLab that I have nearly finished building ready to try. For this project I am using a 3U rack panel. There are also several MidiBox projects nearing completion so I hope this works!What I was thinking of doing was printing and applying a version of the panel with just the hole centers and any cut-outs marked. This could be used and abused during the fabrication of the panel. Once this stage was completed the vinyl could be stripped off and replaced with the final version. Not sure yet how best to apply the vinyl - I am going to try "floating" it into position with a little soapy water and then carefully squeezing this out. Once dry the vinyl could be trimmed with a very sharp knife.The inks from the printer are supposed to be waterproof so hopefully this will work without any smudging.Bubbles can be pricked with a sharp needle and the air released if this becomes a problem.I should be attempting this in the next week or two and will report back.All the bestJohn Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stryd_one Posted October 20, 2007 Report Share Posted October 20, 2007 You guys should search for the thread where we discussed military panels and cockpit simulator panels.... This is how the cockpit guys make backlit panels. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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