Beater Scale Build Door Lettering

[TrailSnail]

Sharing the method I used to put some door lettering on a beater Tamiya F350 high lift build.

Started by stripping the body of multiple layers of old paint.


The painting started with a gray primer, flat black driver's door and random light misting of flat black for a more weathered look. The goal is to have a scale junkyard dog. I decided on lettering the doors after painting, so I masked off a section of the door and did a light, uneven coat of almond color paint. I did not want perfectly white and crisp lettering.


The next step was applying vinyl lettering with the help of an x-acto knife to help get the lettering relatively straight. I penciled in lines before applying the letters to help keep things straight. Fortunately this is a beater project, the tiny letters would be difficult to get perfect. Any type or color of lettering and picture can be used since they are only being used as a paint mask.


Here is one side with lettering applied:


Mask and paint the body color. This process would be easier if you are painting the whole body at once. Since I decided on this after already painting, I needed to mask off windows etc.


The end result worked well for my "auto salvage" build.





As a side note, the extended cab also allowed for the Tamiya 3 speed transmission to be moved back and up for much better clearance for crawling. Traxxas driveshafts completed the transmission lift.


Next to a stock Tamiya high lift for comparison: