Thread: alpine, mcintosh & chopped up liquid cooled dell++

hey, thanks guys... good to know that I can inspire some to go beyond what they would normally consider doing, just by seeing it done by someone else.

Im limited in what I can do to the truck while waiting for the electronics to be finished, but I do have to make an overlay for the instrament panel with the new 6.3... I can't really finish that cause I still haven't even been able to get that screen to fire up yet, but still working on that....

I have decided that I will do the overlay for this cluster myself... I considered having a company do it for me, but I think I can do a good job myself really, & once I get all the materials to do it, I can then do many other things with it, & I can try several designs, rather than paying a few hundred for just one piece....

I start by scanning the original faceplate into photoshop, then stitching the 2 halfs togeather to have one faceplate at the right scale, then I can alter & build the layers I need... the faceplate will consist of several transparency sheets stacked to form the faceplate, & then the whole thing laminated or bonded to a thin sheet of lexan...

the good thing of doing it myself is I can play with a few different designs & build them, & then check the results when backlit... heres a sample of one of the files I'm working on, should be as easy as printing this on my printer with full sheet transparency lables, then sticking them stacked to get the end result... I'll see how that works out, & how many layers it takes to get what effect... size wise is fine, as I don't have to do this in one piece, there will be a left & right side, with the whole center being the screen, but all photoshop work is done as one piece

my guess is that this will look best if the final clear sheet is slightly opaque & flat finish, rather than glossy, but I can try both & see.. those 2 red labels aren't finalized at all & will be a bit smaller... & I want to play a bit with 3d effects... I like a 3d looking gauge cluster... I can also play around with lighting.... will this friggin ever end???? someday

I just though of something..... can a printer even print white?!?! I kinda doubt it... maybe if I need to go white, I may have to do a vinyl layer... but transparency will be an issue.. hmm... still need to play more & see... maybe a paper laminated layer... a sheet of paper will be transparent enough for a backlit warning lite to show through it....

maybe I'll consider a colored texture instead of white too... that would be easier now that I think about it... either way, at night the whole thing will be dark except the blue indicators & lines, & maybe the designs will iluminate...

WOW. like i said... never ends. Thats a great idea though, prining out the dash, Literally. I dont think wiht the average printer you can print in "white" it will just print a lack of ink. If you do a VERY light grey, you might be able to get what you are looking for, and i bet, depending if you want to shell out the cash. find a high end printer that will print white... that is if they exist.

Maybe this might help?

http://desktoppub.about.com/cs/printing/f/white_ink.htm

I remember those alps printers that printed white... surprised nothing like this is available.... a white sheet of paper may work... I'll figure something out ... if I can get someone with a vinyl plotter that can match my scale I could even make a spraymask... forget about trying to cut all those markings out with an exacto by hand though....

this is what it could look like at night...

Thats pretty sweet. I was thinking. Maybe you could have a solid mask on everything but the circles themeseves. that way you could have a similar look, with white paper behind the gauges and something else fo the rest. That way the xacto work would only be two circles and you would have the whole gauge backlit. or something

I just ran across some info on LCD uses in instrument clusters so I figured I'd post it.
http://www.optrex.com/products/markets/auto/
Several links there.

You could also use EL as lighting less colors but I think it looks better. I ordered a sheet from here http://www.beingseen.com/ I will be changing my interior from ugly green to blue EL.