Technical So You'd Like Real Gold Leaf Lettering On Your Racecar...

That's incredibly beautiful

 

My old friend Spike Parham, spun the gold on my Roadster.

 

Geez, he doesn't have a famous Scottish uncle called Billy Connolly does he....???

 

INCREDIBLE.

 

Digging those front wheels, too.

 

Love the look.
But I may have to settle for mylar film when I letter my champ car.

 

No, he had a famous uncle named Bud Parham, who was an early Hotrodder in the Northwest.

 

Apparently, when wishing to pull a fine line, some detail painters "point" their brushes by twirling them between their lips... I've read that the (mostly) women who painted luminous watch dials tended to contract cancer from the "Radium" paint they had ingested...

 

It is water based size
-or water and a smidge of dissolved gelatin over gesso
water based size = no lustre on loose gilt items
AU is noble -no oxide, but still porous = i.e. IF you left that picture frame outisde the wood would rot -interior only
so what he is doing is simply 'livening' up his water based size with a lick.
when gilding glass with watre and gelatin, you burnish the gold against the glass, BUY back it up with enamel and then clear varnish to protect from the window cleaner.

more interesting is mercury gilding and the dissolving of ones face


when applying gold leaf to a cars body, you use an oil size - SUPER weak well thinned
the cars automotive paint finish is hard, IF you have a thick sticky layer of size it will wrinkle
IF you intend to give a car body a go, buy oil size and thin it 10-1. IF it goes 'off' you simply breath on it to liven it up.
Gold Leaf - Gold & Metal Leaf (handover.co.uk)
damn, its gone up again....
£1 a leaf...................

design nice graphics
have masks made with outline - place with out line
thin gold size to nothing with turps.
let it go off
apply transfer leaf to car.
pull out out-line and paint outline to masks edge and ridge in gold = difficult
if the gild turns out bad, engine turn with velvet spinner.

 

Thanks for the added information. I was only aware of gel size being used for reverse glass gilding but not for any kind of surface gilding. There's been something of a revival of hand lettering in the area but nobody around here has made any real push with gold leaf yet. I'm sure the economy has something to do with that.

Probably the best glass gilding I've ever seen has to have been the work of one of your countrymen, David A. Smith.

 

A perfect red hot rod/drag race build for Valentine’s Day expectations…

Hello,

When our close friend, Atts Ono, was helping us get our C/Gas Willys coupe together, he had already started his build from scratch. Over the years of helping us, he kept doing his late night build. After our accident, he took responsibility and helped us as well. Our mom was going nuts, every time she saw the “walking mummy” in our Westside of Long Beach house. So, Atts Ono allowed us to keep the remnants of our 40 Willys at his garage, outside, under a canvas tarp.

During the aftermath, he began to really get moving on his build, forgoing any inclination to pursue sports, despite his high skills as an excellent point guard in basketball. His “thing” was being a master craftsman in his mechanical skills and designing. So, he got to work on his own 40 Willys Coupe for the next couple of years.

As the last few months were approaching, he showed me his idea of lettering. He knew of some great pinstriper guys and painters. But, wanted to do the whole build, himself. So, watching him do some gold leaf practicing on an old hood was time consuming and it took several tries to get a good layer, matching all patterns going the same way. It certainly was a skill that took a lot of patience and kudos to those painters/pinstriper guys that do it for a job.

Jnaki

The outcome of his work is/was outstanding. His machining skills were top notch, as he made things that he could not buy and made them look like a custom aircraft application. The roots of his aluminum machining skills came from the gobs of aluminum sheets, blocks and chunks of aluminum we were able to bring home from the nearby Douglas Aircraft Surplus Yard that was well know to many So Cal area racers.


But, as meticulous as he was, the final outcome or disappearance of his Red 1940 Willys Coupe with the distinct gold leaf lettering on the sides, is a mystery. How could such a great build and finished coupe go missing after 1971? The last Westcoast sighting was the Willys rolling up into a covered truck for transport to somewhere in the Midwest with its new owner.

Midwest racers and families, scour your history from that time period to see if a relative/family member purchased the completed Willys from So Cal in 1971.

 

When I restored the Ron Bizio truck, I had a local sign painter named Jere Harley, match the original as close as possible. Hard to beat Blue and Gold.

 

Looks like Jere did you right! Makes my eyes feel good just looking at it.

 

Why do some of the samples shown here look like they have engine turning patterns on them?

 

Both of the samples I posted are "Spun Gold Leaf", by hand.

 

I can't really see it in your photos Marty, maybe just not close up enough. But this photo for instance shows it clearly.

 

Hello B4U,

Here is a good link as to how those swirls came into play. It is similar to the old way that we used to take a fine steel wool and point/twist to get the swirls on metal, chrome or aluminum for that machined look. That was a long time before the machines took over and made perfect swirls in a variety of patterns.
https://www.motortrend.com/how-to/how-to-apply-gold-leaf-letter-project-notso-special/



Jnaki
The gold leaf was something beyond our skills at the time. But, it looks time consuming and fun at the same time.

 

Ahhhh, very cool. I used to have a buddy, a sign painter, used to do side jobs lettering things, motorcycle tanks, etc. I watched him do gold leafing, but that was not part of it. Thanks for that!

 

I believe that if you're looking at the "spun" or "turned" gold leaf finish then you're looking at the for-real, honest to god, spendy, genuine gold leaf. The "true" gold stuff is so thin and soft enough to produce the turned finish with very little pressure.

If you're on a budget though, there is an "artificial" gold leaf which is made of an alloy of some sort. It's what you'll find in the craft and art supply stores at a much more reasonable price. But it doesn't have quite the WOW factor of the real gold, and it won't take the turned finish. But it still looks OK for the right kind of simpler projects.

 

Blues, here is another view.

 

Ahhh, yes you can see it there very clear.

 

see this crap gild,
its about 4 by 4 3.5'' gold leaf squares
you can see the joints
you can see the wrinkling
its alright up on a store front as you will never focus upon it.
on a car body you can get real close.
when you spin it, you obscure the joints and wrinkles

 

Longtime master of gold leaf, striping, and hand lettering in these parts - Leonard Wren.