Front panels refinishing?

seynos

New Member
Hello and happy Easter,

I have a really nice vintage stereo amplifier in black anodized aluminium. The problem is that the white text is worn off in some regions. Now the question is: is there some one some where in the world who can do a decent refinish job? It should be possible, but it requires skills and equipment. The thing doesn’t have a scratch on it, so its really a shame that the text decided to leave the front panel.

Best regards
Jon
 
Very tough to do.
These faces were originally done as industrial silk screens.
Impractical do to all, never mind missing portions of some of the lettering.
The only thing that comes to mind is an old product called Letraset.
They made it mostly in black, but it was also available in white.
It is transfer lettering you burnish onto your surface.
Long shot to find your font and point size, but you never know.
Do a Google search, scour that auction site, and you might get very lucky, and find both your font and size in white (assume it's white).
In the old days, before computers and word processors, you would have been able to find a match.
Not sure about today.
 
You can make your own dry transfer lettering sheets. Someone sells a kit to do it. You use your printer after preparing suitable artwork. Do a google search and you will find them.
Doing silkscreening at home is not difficult. Plenty of people sell the needed supplies. Just make a scan of your front panel and touch up the scan with a graphic program.
Rick
 
Thanks for all your helpful replies! I will start to look into it... And post back if I manage to actually make it work :scratch2:
 
I've tried the DIY silkscreening, but unfortunately did not achieve success. I think my emulsion got old, I could not get it to wash out cleanly after exposure.
 
Is the front plate removable and flat? Are you more interested in matching the original, or just having it look good?

Front Panel Express could emboss the lettering to your specs and also do color fills for a permanent label. They do allow you to provide your own metal, and have free design software available on their website. If you get the original plate redone, I expect you'd want to clean it up good and polish off all the old lettering before sending it in.

They did a nice job here ...

tp-switches-mounted.jpg
 
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