In effect, if I read your reply correctly, as Squirrel stated, it's art, right? Interesting thread for sure.
I worked for Mickey Thompson during the 60s , I was his advertising and promo manager. If you look closely on the shown valve cover you can see the border of the "slug".. that image was generated by the foundry Buddy Barr in So Gate, they are still there. Each founds had a pattern maker on staff and that guy would make the slug, carving it out of wood, as we used many different foundries over the years, the type face would vary, the first modern procedure was used by Peat Manufacturing, for the new die cast valve covers. If you look at old M/T ads from that era I used rub off fonts, but we were not to consistent, The earlier cast products just said Thompson, people around the shop started calling Mickey MT, some said it was a tongue in cheek jap, as the empty welding bottles would have M/T written on them in chaulk, who knows, Better than Merriam Thompson, Mickey's actual name
Only on the HAMB would the ad and promo manager chime in on a thread about fronts 50 years later. You just gotta love this resource.
I worked for LST typographers in the 60s-70s and did some ad work for an agency that handled MT products. The font we used was Linotype/Mergenthaler City and City bold. Check it out online. http://www.911fonts.com/font/download_CityBoldBoldRegular_2061.htm
I expect the ads and catalogs used a commercially available typeface. But he was asking about the logo on cast valve covers...which is quite a different subject.
Ok, I am a type/font geek and this has been a fun read.... And to hear from one that was there,, Great! Thanks all!!
My interest is in engraving my valve covers for personal use, the closer I get to a font like the M/T the better they'll be. Using a font available to all for free shouldn't be a problem.
Answers from post #43; "If you look at old M/T ads from that era I used rub off fonts, but we were not to consistent" "if you look closely on the shown valve cover you can see the border of the "slug".. that image was generated by the foundry Buddy Barr in So Gate, they are still there. Each founds had a pattern maker on staff and that guy would make the slug, carving it out of wood"
When I wanted to reproduce my Falcon script emblems in a decal, the first graphics people I spoke to wanted to know what font it was. Like our friend Squirrel, I told them it wasn't a font, it was art. They didn't understand the difference. The next graphics people I talked to understood. For $30, they scanned the emblem and then doctored it up on the computer to create the decal.
Which is fantastic for replicating something...its what I'd do on a GT350 if I needed it there because most current offerings aren't accurate. In my case I need a capital "T" and many more letters, which wouldn't fit in the space available if they were an exact duplicate. I'd hoped they were based on a font, where variants are wider, thinner, bolder, ertc. but remain similar. Im pleased with what I found, the spirit of the M/T will remain and the space will be adequate for whats needed.
Thanks for clarifying. Any halfway decent graphic designer should be able to reproduce what you need without too much effort.
The font I located needs modifications but it's pretty cool. When my car is finished I'll do a thread on it and allow the results to speak for themselves. One thing I have learned here is among the atta-boys and thumbs up will be plenty of dissenters, so I'll wait until I'm happy with it before wading through the posts of what someone else thinks I should have done. But here's a hint...
If you need to match a specific font/typeface/art, post a clear picture dead-on of the item in question.. I can trace it out in modern CAD and create a sketch, a vector file, a solid model.. Hell, I might even model up the whole damn valve cover if you give me dimensions.
The Jalopy Journal
