Is the inkjet decal media sprayed with Krylon Clear or Fixative before or after the decal is cut from the media & trimmed to size?
Thank you in advance for your response.

J Scott
Englewood, Fl

I do mine before I cut

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Super Tight Lines......Don

Same!! If I'm doing a whole sheet, I spray the sheet and when I cut them, I spray again

Mike (Southgate, MI)
If I don't want to, I don't have to and nobody can make me (except my wife) cuz I'm RETIRED!!

What computer program do you use to print your decals & what kind of paper? This is a whole new idea to me.
more information on this subject wouod be helpful to someone else besides me.

Rex,
Do a search on ''all dates'' and you will come up with truckloads of information on making your own decals. Many software options depending on skill level.
I am also new to the decal thing but have learned a ton from the forum.
Good Luck

Jim,

I spray mine afte I cut it.

Sometimes I'll cut the decal to size before I run it through the printer, whether I want to be careful not to ruin a whole sheet in a jam, or I'm using the tail end of a piece. After it's cut, I'll take a loop of Scotch tape and tape the decal media to a sheet of paper. When you do this, you can use your media efficiently and make one-off decals with ease. Test print on a blank sheet of paper and tape the decal media in the same place and it works quite well. I typically put my info on the rod in one-off decals designed for each rod, and don't build enough rods to justify printing full sheets of basic labels. If I had a need to print full sheets, I would do it as Mike does.

Rex,

Most any word processor these days has the ability to make the type of labels we use on rods. You'll probably need to adjust some properties of the shapes, text boxes, and images to get them to layer on top of one another, but the basic functionality is there. You can easily resize and crop images, etc. If you need more advanced manipulation of images or other more advanced techniques, then a dedicated graphics program is needed, look for The GIMP (open source), Paint Shop Pro (old unsupported versions are freely available), Photoshop, etc. I usually work in Pages from Apple, or MS Word for basic decals.

As far as media, I still use the white vinyl media from Swampland, and still have some of the metallic media left from them as well. I think Papillo is one source of a variety of suitable media options.

Joe

Papillo comes in White vinyl, silver, gold and silver Holoshine metallics. I believe the white is carried by Swampland and the rest can be ordered from [www.papilio.com]

Mike (Southgate, MI)
If I don't want to, I don't have to and nobody can make me (except my wife) cuz I'm RETIRED!!

I thought if you sprayed after trimming, you may not be able to separate from the backing??

Harry,
I sprayed after trimming and had only minor issue seperating. Had major issue with keeping decal straight while applying but that is opertator failer. Out of 4 attempts only one had to be coaxed to seperate. all others did just fine.
JS

I don't think it matters to performance whether you spray before or after cutting. The decal will be encased in epoxy, probably the ends will be covered with thread and epoxy, and only the "seam" parallel with the blank axis is the issue. It too will be covered with epoxy. And on the bottom out of the sun. I have seen no issues with decals I have made that were sprayed before cutting, and some of mine are getting to be years old. Even one of my early ones done with plain paper glued to the blank looks as good now as the day it was done. The important point is to spray it to fix the color and offer UV protection.

Michael,
The reason for my original quesiton was if the edges of the decal need sprayed so the when dipped in water the ink didn't bleed on the edges. I now spray mine after the cut and give a good coat on the edges for insurance. i had one bleed, may have been to light of a top coat but as i said i like the extra insurance.

js