clock faces

Post by **Lude-dude** » Mon Feb 20, 2012 1:10 pm

word of warning speedo needle is delicate

you will have to take it off if you want to fit these

Post by **NafemanNathan** » Mon Feb 20, 2012 1:26 pm

Not with 4th gen dials you don't.

Post by **NafemanNathan** » Mon Feb 20, 2012 1:28 pm

Also, all those templates you have there for the 4th gen Littlefella are for the non EL dials.

littlefeller · Post by **littlefeller** » Mon Feb 20, 2012 10:16 pm

whats an el dial?, if you use overhead projector film then you simply cut up to the needle then you dont have to remove it

Post by **Pushki** » Tue Feb 21, 2012 1:27 am

littlefeller wrote:whats an el dial?

Maybe you should get something like this made up.

KeithB · Post by **KeithB** » Tue Feb 21, 2012 3:37 am

Nice one
I'd be up for some manual 5th gen dials

Post by **NafemanNathan** » Tue Feb 21, 2012 8:27 am

littlefeller wrote:whats an el dial?, if you use overhead projector film then you simply cut up to the needle then you dont have to remove it

You forgot about removing the original dials bud

littlefeller · Post by **littlefeller** » Tue Feb 21, 2012 8:30 am

but arnt they just lights behind? on my bike dials the markings on the face were left unprinted (clear overhead projector film) and the blue just shone through as before, infact if i put another film underneath (coloured) i could also change the colour of the markings, on my bike i changed them from blue to red, looked real cool.

if you use flexible film, you wont even need to remove the original faces , just the small screws, then replace the screws once the new faces are in

supose i could even have them made from vinyl.

then when you get bored with them, just change for a different set

Post by **NafemanNathan** » Tue Feb 21, 2012 8:44 am

If you take Pushki's EL dials...

What you see there is all one piece of 2mm thick plastic of sorts. The black is on the outer surface and opaque. The coloured areas (so the red and turquoise) are on the underside and basically coloured transparency glued on. If you removed the transparency the markings would obviously be clear, or you could add your own colours, or put additional colours on top of the existing red and turquoise to mix a new colour.

Basically the neons behind shine through the gaps in the black, so if you were to literally just add a new face printed on projector film (like you're suggesting) you would still only be limited to the existing markings, and being that it is only projector film and anything printed on it will remain translucent, everything on the original clock face will still be visible through it.

What you'd need to do is make a whole new clock face to replace the original, like the ones you can buy.

I've got the makings of my own custom one, but I've not finished the design yet, and it's far down on my list of things to do. I'm still undecided on what method to use. I was toying with the idea of vinyl on acrylic, but I think I'd use that as a template mask and then spray heat resistant matt black paint on it before peeling it off. Then add coloured transparency to the underside like the original.

Make sense?

littlefeller · Post by **littlefeller** » Tue Feb 21, 2012 8:52 am

yes makes perfect sense, just like my bike dials, on my bike i did remove the needles simply because i had raised the rev limit and as you say it would only show the original decals. the film was printed mat at a photo shop and was as good as the originals. but yes if you change the decals then face would have to be removed, unless you could find a way of difusing the light shining through the originals

, that wouldnt be to difficult

i like pushkis dials

yes thinking about it, my bike dials had a piece of clear plastic on the underside to do just this (diffuse the light) it had just one bulb (led) in the middle towards the top of the dial, when the plastic was in place and the dial face on it only shone through the clear decals. simples

also on other bike dials i have taken apart, the led bulb was inside a plastic outer ring and the light would travel all the way around.

question then is does anough light get through the original decals to do this without it getting too dim

the next question is - can some of the covering on the original dials be removed? the reason i ask is because i recently removed the blue covering on my jdm high level brake light, it was a large section, not just on the decals, but would only shine through the prelude decal left uncovered by the black background, if i scratch the black part then i would have been left with a large blue square, so assuming the dials are the same

damn, but then you would still need to remove the dials