Can someone advise me on how practical / difficult it is to re-letter freight cars (or passenger cars) for a different road-- and/or a different number? Also locomotives (suspect we’re talking approx same level of difficulty).
Secondly, in keeping with the first question, what are the various techniques involved?
Third, is it possible to get custom decals/dry-transfers for my own roadname/logo/etc? If so, how/where can that be done? Is it expensive? How do you go about doing it?
It is not particularly difficult, but it all depends on what you are trying to accomplish. If you want to totally remove all the markings from a locomotive, the job will be tougher than just removing and changing the reporting marks of a freight car.
There have been a lot of threads on this site and others on how to remove old decals or painted-on lettering. I’d do a site search and a Google search for more info.
The biggest issue is removing the lettering without destroying the paint job. On the other hand, you will see freight cars every day that have changed hands and reporting marks accordingly. They are usually stencilled in a hurry without any effort to look neat. Some of these cars still retain the logos of the original owner.
A number of manufacturers provide both road-specific decal sheets or generic letters-and-numbers sheets. There are also custom decal makers who will make whatever you want.
I make my own decals, using special paper available at some hobby shops, or online. The process is a bit time-consuming, and about as exciting as watching paint dry, since most of time is spent, well, watching ink or decal coatings dry. The big restriction with home decal printing is that you can’t print white, and pale colors don’t fare to well, either.
So, for my own Moose Bay Transit Authority and Strumpet Brewery lines, I chose light base colors with dark lettering and logos. That way, I can easily do the whole thing myself. It’s not really a difficult process, either. If you search the forums for “decals,” you’ll find numerous earlier threads devoted to this process. Personally, I find it very satisfying.
The easiest cars I’ve found to reletter…are the Budd passenger cars by Walthers. At the time, I wanted another Penn Central car. However, the one I wanted wasn’t offered in PC paint. It was pretty easy to remove the New York Central lettering with an x-acto blade. Harder, was trying to find black PC worms and letterboards in HO scale!