Retro military control panel for exhaust fan

[hansena]

Holy Crap, that looks amazing! Nice work!

[CharlesAndThatch]

Wow, this really is such a great build, Brotron! The details are spot on! I used to work on old Sikorsky S64 Skycranes, and they used the same style panels. And as markevans36301 pointed out, the only difference was the use of slotted camlocks.
I don’t know if it would save a lot of time, but we would use these paint sticks to fill in the lettering… https://www.amazon.com/Markal-83420-Paintstik-Solid-Marker/dp/B004N84BKA/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1517864703&sr=8-4&keywords=markal+paint+stick&dpID=41kZNajEHaL&preST=SX342_QL70&dpSrc=srch

If you were to paint the panel flat black, then fill in the markings with the paint stick, you wipe away the excess and you are good to go!

[redshift]

@Brotron

I took a big screen shot and outlined it in Illustrator

I have used that trick many times for (non-commercial) typeface use! Love it. Easier than installing it if it’s just a word or phrase.

[ryan_haskell]

Superb build Brotron! Thanks for the finishing details, and especially for cleaning up the TTF font file.

[Brotron]

Those paint sticks are kind of cool. I can see how that would work since they don’t dry. Did the lines get all grimy with dirt after a while?

[suntzu07]

This is awesome and definitely something I will attempt when my GF arrives. I have some of the old, original, equipment from planes that I will use eventually.

[ewrenn]

Outstanding. Great job

[m1llipede]

@Brotron

Proof Grade med draft board

Wow, this is amazing. Very well done!
I built a home flight simulator with many laser cut panels using my Glowforge and this seems like a better technique than I was using. Can you explain more of how you did the white lettering? it seems that you covered the black painted panel. But I’m confused by how you painted the letters so perfectly. Did you cut a pass of letters only as a guide to paint through?

[Brotron]

@m1llipede

Can you explain more of how you did the white lettering? it seems that you covered the black painted panel. But I’m confused by how you painted the letters so perfectly. Did you cut a pass of letters only as a guide to paint through?

Thanks, and you are correct, I do a separate engrave pass. I just photo documented a rundown here Some other folks had asked earlier, so I was already woking on a new build. Hope it’s clear.

Driver Panel, Out of Control!

There were some questions about my painted inlay after my last control panel project, so I wanted to do a new one and photo document the steps. I didn’t really need another fan controller but I did need an organizer for a set of Wera Hex Drivers I had, so I mashed them together and came up with this. [HDS1] [HDS2] I used a simple technique, and probably one that lots of people are already using. It takes advantage of the masking tape layer to fill in the engraved parts. You can see here how c…

[CharlesAndThatch]

They dry after about 12 hours or so. And yeah, they turn that same dingy cream color after a while. You nailed it!