MAKING YOUR OWN HO DECALS WITH A PERSONAL COMPUTER
by Scott Vargo

 You can make your own decals for HO slot car bodies with the aid of a Personal Computer, a scanner, and a good ink jet printer.  This is very popular subject on the Bulletin Boards.  With a lot of trial and error, I have come up with a pretty good system.  Granted you do need some graphic skills in software programs, but this procedure isn't too difficult.

Avery Clear Address Labels. #8660. $25 (ouch) for 25 sheets of 30 labels each.  750 labels.  The labels are 1" x 2 5/8".  This can be a pain, but you can work around it.  You just have to split things into 2 labels per car.  These only come as labels from what I can find.  It would be great if you could find a big sheet of this stuff.
You can either scan decals from models, or download from the web. Most decal places have small images of the real thing, which are almost perfect for HO cars!!  Of course you couldn't re-sell them, but they are great for your own cars.  When scanning decals from models, you will have to use your Paint Program to remove all of the blue background.

You need a good Paint program like Adobe Photoshop or Corel PhotoPaint to do editting.  You also could use Adobe Illustrator or CorelDraw for importing many different decal sets to print at once.  (You will need some kind of illustration program to layout the borders of the label sheets.)  The decals you scan or download will need to be re-arranged to be split into 2 labels, since the labels are too small to fit a whole set.  In Photo-Paint, ^ Copy/Paste ^ parts of the decal set into a sizable area to fit the label.  Do a lot of test prints for sizing on your car!  (Oh ya, BTW, you need a decent ink jet printer too.  Preferably one that prints in four colors.)

Import the Bitmap or JPG decal file into your label layout in Corel Draw or Illustrator.  Place your scanned decal sets into the borders of the label layout.  Do some test prints on plain white paper to get everything lined up, so you don't waste TOO MANY label sheets. (...and you will waste a few unfortunately.) Once you have proofed the decal set locations, print your decals to the address labels.
 

** DON'T FORGET, EVERYTHING MUST PRINTED IN REVERSED IF YOUR ARE GOING TO DO INSIDE DECALS FOR LEXAN. **

Once you have printed some labels, let the ink dry for a bit, and be very careful when handling the printed decals.  They will dry well, but perspiration and oil in your skin will smudge them if you're careless.  Now comes the tedious part. (Hey nobody said this is easy..!)  Get an X-Acto or your lexan curved "chicky manicure scissors", and carefully cut out the decal areas.  Cut as close to the printed area as possible. Use tweezers to position your decals.  Use toothpicks, plastic pics, or something stiff with a small rounded end to roll and rub down the decals.  Use caution.  Use some small paper pieces over the decal to keep from rubbing the ink on the decal.  You may find it is easier to lay the body on the decal side, and rub the body to help adhere the decal without smudging.  The labels are very sticky, and won't come up easily once they are stuck down.

Painting: If you plan on putting these on the inside of a lexan, you need to back bright colors with a white base, if you are painting the car with a darker color.  **You may notice some color bleeding if use the Parma Fastcolor water based paints.  Try using the standard paints.  I have found that the ink jet inks won't bleed with these.
If you going to use these on the outside, you may have to paint a white base color over (under) the body paint where the decal will go, if using darker body paints.  When using decals over white or bright colors, they really stand out!  Go over them with clear acrylic nail polish for a nice protective gloss and sealer.

< On the left and below are many decal sets you can use for your projects.  Click in the decal sets for larger images.  You can right click on the larger image to save to your hard drive.  These sizes are all pretty close to printable HO scale, but you may have to resize them to suit your own needs.

Good luck.  You can make your own stuff if you feel creative.