Mitch's next project.. Zaccaria Universe

[Strangeways]

Looks really good.

Not a criticism, just an observation and curious question. Why not remove the rails before painting?

Mainly because its a royal pain in the arse to do at the best of times!!

Though i WILL remove rails on a game if i have to for any reason, usually because it just makes it simpler when making stencils on some games.. some 70s Bally games come to mind, eg 6million$man or Silverball Mania are two that i resprayed that i removed the rails on. Oh and Stern Dracula it was necessary to remove them.

That they are - and removal can sometimes damage them. However, I simply take my time with removal, and it does give you the opportunity to regrain the siderails and replace the nails. So there is a reward for the tedious job of removing them.

That topcoat looks AMAZING - Looks like it come straight out of a paint booth - Well done.

[Mr Pinbologist]

BACKBOX STENCILLING;

Now that the backbox has had about a week now for the paint to dry, I thought it was time to start redoing the stenciled designs.

To do this I used clear adhesive contact book covering rather that my usual cardboard method, as the stenciled art on this game would’ve been impossible to do with cardboard due to the very clean edges and sharp/fine points of the original paint. Im guessing that on these Zac games must’ve had some kind of adhesive stencil used in the factory?

Anyway after some experimentation I found the best way to do this was to place the contact straight onto the sides (a real pain to do without getting too many air bubbles btw!!), place a few sheets of carbon paper over the contact and taped the tracings of the art I’d done previously over the top of the contact and carbon paper. Then I simply traced the art onto the contact with a pen and ruler (1st pic). Worked a treat!

2nd pic shows the backbox with the traced on artwork ready to be cut out with a sharp scalpel and a ruler. First I cut out the sections that were to be sprayed red.

Before any colour was sprayed on I sprayed on some basecoat colour to seal the edges and help prevent paint bleed (this tip was picked up on a resto thread here, cant remember who originally posted it though). I allowed about half an hour for this to dry before spraying on the red, in two coats (3rd pic) not too heavy.. just enough to cover and not be see through anywhere. After allowing the red to become touch dry (about 30 minutes) I cut out the sections of contact for the blue, and masked off the red sections. As an added precaution, I placed some strips of 1 inch thick strips of wood on the cab to keep the newspaper from touching the red, and sticking to it.. yes I’ve done silly things like that before, and I wasn’t taking any chances. Most sane people would wait a day or so for the paint to fully dry before doing the next colour but I’m not most people.. lol … patient bugger aren’t I?  

[Mr Pinbologist]

Ok here is one side done!! (1st pic) I DID get a small amount of paint bleed in the red on the bottom edge but nothing that I wont be able to fix.

Rest of the pics are the opposite side being done. I did all of this in one day! To do the other side, I clamped a piece of plywood to my bench and hung the backbox on that from the inside, so that the newly painted first side would not be damaged.

What is it with insects and paint??? The bastards just HAVE to land in it when its wet! After spraying the red on this side and leaving it to dry, I came back to find a f*^kn bug stuck there! Luckily I was able to remove it, without doing any harm to the paint.

[Mr Pinbologist]

And…. VOILLA!!  The finished product

Next cab of the rank will the cabinet stenciling.. hopefully next weekend!!

[Mr Pinbologist]

Looks really good.

Not a criticism, just an observation and curious question. Why not remove the rails before painting?

Mainly because its a royal pain in the arse to do at the best of times!!

Though i WILL remove rails on a game if i have to for any reason, usually because it just makes it simpler when making stencils on some games.. some 70s Bally games come to mind, eg 6million$man or Silverball Mania are two that i resprayed that i removed the rails on. Oh and Stern Dracula it was necessary to remove them.

That they are - and removal can sometimes damage them. However, I simply take my time with removal, and it does give you the opportunity to regrain the siderails and replace the nails. So there is a reward for the tedious job of removing them.

That topcoat looks AMAZING - Looks like it come straight out of a paint booth - Well done.

Thanks Nino, im pretty happy with how the paint has turned out.. its all out of spray cans.. Its dulux brand paint.. the BEST spray enamel bar none i reckon.

another reason i didnt remove the side rails was that they were already in great condition, they'll need little more that a good polish, they already have an almost mirror like shine to them so i didnt want to risk ruining them.

[deadlydave]

Looks great Mitch 

[goodolddays]

Great work as usual Mitch 

Cheers
Dave

[ddstoys]

Looking good Mitch those tiny little jagged bits would have been a nightmare to get right 

[SPURR]

Hey Mitch I have been using the hobbie tape method for my stenciling because it gives you clean lines (no need to seal for bleeding required) and is low sticking. BUT the hobbie tapes are not cheap, There hard to get (not many places sell it) and there is a bit more mucking around to do the job. I have thought of using the clear book plastic as you did but I was afraid of how hard would it be to remove after painting (lifting up your base coat) or some plastic films I have used before, when the paint was applied it had a reaction with the plastic and started to shwithel up. 
So seeing how good your end result came up I think it may have answered my questions.
1. Was it hard to remove the stick on clear after painting ?
2. Did it cut easilly with the scalple with out damaging the base coat ?
3. Did it leave any glue residue behind at all ?
ps. good job 

[Mr Pinbologist]

Hi SPURR, to answer your questions in order..

1. The contact came off pretty easily. It wont lift any paint if the cab is properly prepared before painting. I've been using clear contact on playfields when restoring, im doing a Stern Wildfyre pf at the moment, most of it is to be repainted, sticking it over newly painted sections to mask off those areas while painting adjacent areas. it has lifted NO new paint at all. though some of the old pf paint comes up occasionally but those bits will be redone anyway...
getting off track slightly... but provided the paint prep is done right you shouldnt have any probs using contact.
 
Sealing with basecoat was done as a precaution, probably wasnt necessary, ive NEVER had paint bleed under contact when painting playfields.

2. cuts nice n easy with a good new sharp scalpel blade, you dont need to push down real hard with the blade either, so shouldnt damage the basecoat. on a couple of bit where i pushed the blade a litle bit too hard it cut into the bascoat slightly and took up a couple of tiny bits of basecoat but was nothing major that couldnt be easily fixed. though that was due to carelessness on my part, and that the blade wasnt a new one. once i had the hang of it NO paint came up.

3. left no glue residue at all.

[big dog]

looks new,amazing work once again

[Mr Pinbologist]

CABINET STENCILLING;

I’ve been taking my time doing this, been working on it for the last two weeks in my spare time after work and on weekends, I just got the 2nd side finished this morning after spraying on the blue on the 2nd side yesterday.

I used the same process as used on the backbox… clear contact, trace the stenciled art onto the contact etc etc. this time as I said I took my time, allowing each colour to dry for about 24 hours before doing the next. I did one side at a time… spraying on the red, letting it dry then masking off the red and then cutting out the sections of contact for the blue and spraying the blue on. I sprayed on some of the base colour white to help seal the edges before spraying on the red and blue.

Here is the left side being done. Notice that after spraying the red, I cut and removed the contact for the red parts... The reason I did this was to check that everything was ok before doing the next colour… something that I didn’t do when doing the right side. A small amount of paint underspray got under the contact in a couple of spots where the contact lifted a bit.. not a big deal really as it was easily fixed, more on that later.

[Mr Pinbologist]

1st two pics.. Spraying on the blue paint. 1st pics shows the white sealing basecoat sprayed on and 2nd pic shows the left side done. Spraying on the white first proved its worth here, because I actually missed a spot with the white (can be seen in the 1st pic), and when the blue was done it bled under the contact a bit!! Luckily I was able to fix it without repainting, enough to make it look presentable. One the two colours were done, I let them dry a couple of days.

Last two pics show the start of the right side being done.

[Mr Pinbologist]

Right side stenciling progress;

In the 3rd pic you can see one spot where the contact lifted. Fixing these bits was as simple as polishing the overspray off with some Re-po Paint Doctor auto polish. This can be done as soon as an hour or so after the paint has been applied.

[Mr Pinbologist]

And finally some pics of the cab and backbox

The backbox pedestal hasn’t been sprayed as yet in these pics, it was only sat on the cab for the pics. Now I’ll let the paint harden for a few days then I can start putting the parts back on