Obsessive pedal lettering

[Smrtokvitek]

Thanks for the excellent idea and tips. I want to try to 3D print a stencil. My idea is to use an SLA printer so the details/size tolerance can be way better than on an FDM one. By 3D printing, you can make several offset ones to make outlined text for example. That is the theory so far. I have to try it.

 

[Erik S]

Thanks for the excellent idea and tips. I want to try to 3D print a stencil. My idea is to use an SLA printer so the details/size tolerance can be way better than on an FDM one. By 3D printing, you can make several offset ones to make outlined text for example. That is the theory so far. I have to try it.

It would be cool to have some custom templates for standard/ repetitive stuff like In / out and 9v center negative symbols…

 

[darwin999]

OMG, what a trip back in time. I remember 40+ yrs ago using a LeRoy lettering set for labeling data plots for publication. They really do make beautiful letters. The departments graphics arts office (with real graphic artists & draftsmen) had several sets with different fonts. And rapidograph pens with that amazing ink. Very classy - and actually quite appropriate when making classic old stompboxes.

 

[falco_femoralis]

I'm thinking of purchasing one of these sets from ebay. I do handwritten labels as well and I'd like for them to be a bit more repeatable.

What kind of fixture are you using to hold the pedal in place while the letter transfer set does its thing?

 

[Erik S]

I'm thinking of purchasing one of these sets from ebay. I do handwritten labels as well and I'd like for them to be a bit more repeatable.

What kind of fixture are you using to hold the pedal in place while the letter transfer set does its thing?

I have a precision jig table for welding setups. It’s a 3/4 ground plate with a grid of 1/2 13 tapped holes that were done on a CNC so they’re all square to each other. The lettering rig gets mounted to that table so I can reference the clamped enclosure and the drafting arm to the grid.

Here’s a video that shows the fixturing a little better:

I’ve heard from a couple folks expressing interest in buying a lettering set, and one or two who actually bought one, but nobody who’s had any luck getting it to work for lettering pedals. It’s a wildly impractical way to do it . I ended up with this system because it was all stuff I already had and I stubbornly wanted to make it work.

Definitely let me know if you end up trying to put something together!

 

[falco_femoralis]

I think I see. It looks like you have an articulating arm attached to your table that you attach a plate to locate the lower edge of the stencil? And then you can move it and set it up for the different rows of knobs/switches?

When I freehand my lettering it's quite difficult as the marker moves across the surface with less drag than across paper. Also, my pedals have a textured finish which makes it even more difficult to control the marker. I like your idea because it seems like it would stabilize some of that.

It would be neat if there was a way to implement some sort of levering action that would make it so large movements with your stencil hand translated to small movements with the marking piece so you could have more control over fine movements Or maybe the video is sped up

What are the dial calipers for? Do you use those to find the center point of the knob?

 

[Erik S]

It looks like you have an articulating arm attached to your table

Yup. Thats a drafting machine from an old school drafting table.

Drafting machine - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

maybe the video is sped up

Oh yeah, the video is sped way up.

What are the dial calipers for?

I use the calipers to measure how wide the written word will be, then to transfer the measurement to a starting point on a brass dummy-knob. That way the word ends up centered under the knob and doesn’t get overlapped by the knob.

The dummy-knobs sort of replaced what I was doing with the skinny yellow tape in the original post in this thread.

Here’s a post from when I put those together:

https://forum.pedalpcb.com/posts/302693/

 

[falco_femoralis]

Those dummy knob inserts are a good idea. What I do currently is put the board together including pots, install it with knobs, place tape underneath the knobs to form my margins, and take it all back apart like an idiot.

So you write a word down on another pedal and that's how you know the length of the word, measure it with the calipers and you're able to reference the left side caliper blade on your stencil to locate the beginning of the word?

Have you considered how difficult it would be to machine your own stencils so you can insert those into your tracing setup so you don't have to go back and forth between letters? Or is that not really a big deal once you're in a flow?

I know you said it's a lot of work but it seems like one of those things where once you engineer the process, following thru with the work is less stressful

 

[Erik S]

What I do currently is put the board together including pots, install it with knobs, place tape underneath the knobs to form my margins, and take it all back apart

That's pretty much how I used to do it, except I was just mounting loose pots to hold the knobs.

Another faster way to temporarily use knobs would be to get some 1/4" rod, cut it into small pieces, and mount your knobs to the rod stubs. That way you could place and remove the knobs through the top side without having to mount anything. (similar to what I'm doing with the brass dummy knobs)

So you write a word down on another pedal and that's how you know the length of the word, measure it with the calipers and you're able to reference the left side caliper blade on your stencil to locate the beginning of the word?

There are a couple enclosures that sit on the table to support the ruler and template at the same height as the one getting lettered. I've got masking tape on those for writing out my test words. I don't have to pre-write every word since a lot of pedals use the same couple.

Once I have the word width set on the caliper, I set the caliper jaws against the brass knob, visually square the caliper to the enclosure, and rotate the knob until an ink mark on the knob lines up with the left edge. Then when I take the caliper away, the ink mark indicates my starting point. It works as long as the word is narrower than the knob I'm going to use.

Have you considered how difficult it would be to machine your own stencils

If I had a cnc router/ engraver that would be a cool project. All my machines are manual though.

Bouncing between letters on the alphabet template isn't that bad once you get used to it.

once you engineer the process, following thru with the work is less stressful

I do enjoy doing it once it's all set up. I've only been doing it once a year though, and just lettering a big batch of enclosures for whatever pcbs I bought that year. The last batch turned out to be a lot bigger than my winter building motivation, so I've still got most of them waiting to get built out.