Printer cutter for motorcycle graphics?

[David-Foster-]

If you are restoring motorcycles I would say the graphics are the last little bit to finish a restored motorcycle. You must be skilled at doing that, why bother with the ‘vinyl malarkey’.

Surely get a professional to to do them.

Apologies if that’s not what you want. Off the top of my head AFAIK a vinyl printer cutter would be about £10,000 including software. I believe these have to be run all the time or else they dry up. If you are only using it infrequently it would be a bugger to keep cleaning the heads.

[John Childs]

The problem David, is that people restoring or repairing bikes and cars go to dealers and find out how much a set of new decals are, and are appalled by the cost. They’re not wrong because original equipment decals can be expensive but the mistake they make is in thinking that it is possible to get copies made cheaper elsewhere.

Sure, there might only be a couple of quidsworth of material in a £60 graphic but, as we all know, there will probably be two or three hours work in reproducing the artwork, so, by the time the copy is made, it is no cheaper than buying the manufacturers part. Therefore, unless the part is no longer available, why bother?

The only time savings can be made is if the customer wants more than one decal, so that the origination costs can be divided into more units, but they never do. It’s always a one off job for restoration or where they’ve just thrown the bike down the road.

I don’t bother talking to them any more because if I try to charge them £60 for a decal they can buy from the Kawasaki dealer for the same price, they think I am trying to rip them off as well.

Ash, don’t bother. The cost of buying, maintaining and running a machine that will produce a decent quality decal is beyond the casual user. They need to be used a lot before they even cover their costs, much less make a profit. You’d be better advised just to buy the graphics in, put on a mark-up, and sell them on. Fast, fun amd fumble free.

In the case of no longer available stuff, my advice is to strike up a good relationship with a friendly signmaker, be prepared to pay him reasonably for his efforts, and avoid all the grief.

[David-Foster-]

Thanks John for backing up what I was saying. I hope we are right 😀 .

I know what you mean about the restorers types. My Dad’s friend and his mates are into old buses!. They restore them and then want all the graphics and adverts of the time on them.

I have done the odd bit of vinyl for them but they are looking at the moment for those inside bus ads above the seats at roof height. About 8" x 26", bigger than A3. They want colour copies. So they need scanning and joining, then photoshopping then printing. One sign company wouldnt do them. One said £15 each which I thought was good. Too dear for our restorers.

[Ash Moloney]

Thanks for the replies and I hope I didn’t cause any offense by saying ‘vinyl malarkey’! 😮

I do understand what you’re saying about the cost of a single graphic being very dear, but I am also looking to reproduce the decals in bulk for sale. So while the first decal will be time consuming, hopefully the reproduction will be easier.

I’m not really looking into this as a casual user, but to one day sell classic bike decal kits. My little dream, I know.

So even if I were to make the graphics in bulk, do you still think that I should just get a signmaker to do them? Or could I get a 2nd hand Roland colourCamm to do the job, for not at least?
I really do appreciate your input, thanks for taking your time to reply!

[Mike Fear]

Ash, I occasionally do some work doing restoration decals for bikes, and I can tell you that the market is VERY small, and chance of getting repeat orders even smaller unfortunately.

The problem being that most old bikes arent classics, they are just ‘old’ and the owners dont generally want to spend a lot of money restoring them. Those that do want a top restoration job and will pay the extra for factory graphics where they are available to keep the bike as original as possible.

Nearly all the work would be one offs, and you would need to be able to reproduce very accurate vector graphics, often from fairly bad, indistinct photos. This in itself is going to be a major stumbling block unless you can already do this as it takes a long time to learn to be able to do it quickly enough to end up making a profit.

A used colorcamm wouldnt be the best choice, you would really need something like an SP300, plus a Gerber Edge for making graphics with metallic gold and silver on them. Minimum spend to set your self up, even buying used machinery is going to be in the region of £12,000.

If I was in your position I would just buy the decals ready made ( there are a couple of places in the US that cover most models and the decals are fairly cheap ) rather than mess around trying to do them yourself.

[Peter Mindham]

Agree with all that has been said. Additionally, some of the older machines use water transfers which are even harder to reproduce and are VERY expensive to make in small runs.

Peter

[Phill Fenton]

Buy Corel Draw and learn to use it proficiently. Then you can reproduce as many designs as you like and store them all electronically.

When you need a set made take the artwork you have created to a signmaker and ask them to print/cut these for you. The price they now charge you should reflect the fact that they are not having to re-create any artwork.

[Lynn Normington]

we have done some for people that don’t mind the price to re-produce, mostly they don’t want to pay and it will always be a one off.

Lynn

[Stephen Morriss]

As Peter said most decals on old bikes are water-slide, these can be reproduced using an Alps printer, but these are like hens teeth now and go for a lot of money + their very temperamental.

Steve