MaximRecoil
Well-known member
I'm back in Maine and have access to my PC again, so I've attached the file here as a split .ZIP file (I had to split it because it exceeded the attachment size limit). The attachment manager for this forum requires a valid file extension, so I had to add ".zip" to the split files. In order to extract this file, remove the ".zip" extension from the files that have the ".z01", ".z02", ".z03", etc. The attachment manager only allows 5 attachments, and since there are 9 parts, I'll include the remaining 4 parts in a second post.
A few things to keep in mind for anyone who may print from this file:
• The colors are just approximations. For the screen printed run that we did a while back, the printer color-matched from my NOS decal (he was local). I'm not willing to mail this decal to anyone for color matching, because it is essentially irreplaceable if something happened to it.
• The original decal uses metallic silver ink (like the metallic silver ink on Punch-Out CPOs and Super Punch-Out "Ducking Pull" stickers) in the parts that I colored grey. This can only be done with screen printing. Inkjets can not do this.
• The gradients in the original decal are halftone (a series of progressively smaller black dots which create the illusion of a gradient). In my .AI file, they are smooth gradients because the half-tone process is done by the printer when making the films (the smooth gradients of the source are converted to halftone). This is another thing that an inkjet can not do (it will simply print out the same smooth gradients as you see in the .AI file).
• The original decal was impressive, in that it used a very fine dot pitch for the halftones, thus creating the illusion of a smoother gradient. The screen printer that I used could not quite match this, but he came close. He said that in order to make such small dots, a very tight screen had to be used, and for that, it required a special type of ink (because the normal ink would clog/dry before getting onto the vinyl properly), and that special type of ink does not dry on its own so it requires special dryers which are large and expensive, and beyond the scope of his small-scale shop. He printed the halftone at 85 LPI, and estimated the original to have been printed at over 100 LPI.
A few things to keep in mind for anyone who may print from this file:
• The colors are just approximations. For the screen printed run that we did a while back, the printer color-matched from my NOS decal (he was local). I'm not willing to mail this decal to anyone for color matching, because it is essentially irreplaceable if something happened to it.
• The original decal uses metallic silver ink (like the metallic silver ink on Punch-Out CPOs and Super Punch-Out "Ducking Pull" stickers) in the parts that I colored grey. This can only be done with screen printing. Inkjets can not do this.
• The gradients in the original decal are halftone (a series of progressively smaller black dots which create the illusion of a gradient). In my .AI file, they are smooth gradients because the half-tone process is done by the printer when making the films (the smooth gradients of the source are converted to halftone). This is another thing that an inkjet can not do (it will simply print out the same smooth gradients as you see in the .AI file).
• The original decal was impressive, in that it used a very fine dot pitch for the halftones, thus creating the illusion of a smoother gradient. The screen printer that I used could not quite match this, but he came close. He said that in order to make such small dots, a very tight screen had to be used, and for that, it required a special type of ink (because the normal ink would clog/dry before getting onto the vinyl properly), and that special type of ink does not dry on its own so it requires special dryers which are large and expensive, and beyond the scope of his small-scale shop. He printed the halftone at 85 LPI, and estimated the original to have been printed at over 100 LPI.

