About Us

ABOUT OUR AIMS AND PRODUCTS:

OUR FOCUS:
Our main interest is in slot car racing, but only in racing models that look like full size race cars. Our own models and our water slide decals are designed to recreate automotive racing subjects primarily in 1/32nd scale, although our decals can also be used to make static models.

Our decals are sized to fit specific model body shells and are an excellent fit to the recommended model. Whenever we can, we use photographs of the original car taken at a known specific time and venue to work from. We prefer not to make ”generic” decal sheets, but to try and recreate a real car from racing history.

The areas of our greatest knowledge and to which we plan to restrict our activities are:

(1) NASCAR: Darkside (1948 to 1970).
(2) NASCAR: Greyside (1970 to 1990).
(3) NASCAR: Modern Era (1990 to date).
(4) The Trans Am Series and SCCA (1966 to 1972).
(5) The restored cars of the Historic Trans Am Series (2000 to date).

OUR PRODUCTS:
We have a number of NASCAR Darkside, NASCAR Modern Era, Trans Am and Historic Trans Am water slide decal sheets available right now with others being still under development.

Please let us know if you would like to see decals for a specific car that we do not already cover, as we are always ready to add further subjects in which a sufficient interest is expressed, and where sufficient photographic reference material is available.

MODEL BODY SHELLS:
Our decals have not been copied and simply re-scaled from a previously commercially issued 1/25th or other scale decal sheet, but are targeted to fit specific currently available or vintage slot car body shells, or 1/32nd scale plastic model car kits, which are suitable for conversion to slot cars. We always specify the recommended body shell with each decal sheet.

Note: You can strip the existing paint finish from a plastic slot car body by immersion in brake fluid, followed by scrubbing with a tooth brush. The fresher and lower the quality of the brake fluid the more effective it is as a paint remover and the shorter the immersion time that is required. With high quality or well used fluid you will have to leave to soak at least overnight. Very high quality fluid (e.g. UK MOT DOT5) may prove to be ineffective. With fresh low quality fluid do not leave for more than 1 to 2 hours depending on the ambient temperature (the warmer it is then the shorter the time). Longer soakings may soften the plastic or alternatively make it brittle. However the body should return to former strength and elasticity after washing in some warm soapy water. It may be discoloured, which is not too important as you will be repainting the body in any case. You should be able to use one batch of brake fluid to strip up to about 20 shells. It will take slightly longer with each successive use before it becomes completely ineffective.

PRINTING:
All our decals are made using ALPS printers. The ALPS ink is applied from a ribbon as a dry wax and it is waterproof. ALPS printers can also print in white and with real metallic foils. The printing is of course at a much higher resolution than any sample illustrations given here.

PAPERS:
We only use highest quality pre-coated water slide decal paper for our printing. The backing paper may be either blue or white, but the film is always clear.

A COMPARISON WITH SCREEN PRINTED DECALS:
These decals are like other water slide decals that you may have used before except:
(1) The decal film is continuous and therefore each individual decal must be cut carefully from the sheet.
(2) ALPS dry inks can be damaged by organic solvents, so after the decal application, unless you intend either not to clear coat (not advised) or to use a water based clear coat on the model, then you must apply your clear lacquer or paint only as a large number of very light coats. We advise you to always test any new clear paint, varnish or lacquer on a spare/scrap decal first.

Note: Our decals, as with all water slide decals, should be applied to a smooth gloss surface for the best results.

CLEAR COAT:
The decals you receive will have been coated with one thin coat of water based clear (usually Johnsons Future/Kleer/Klear) to help to protect them whilst you are applying them to the model. We have no evidence that this clear coat will react adversely with any other clear that you may then choose to use in finishing your model.

Note: We can supply any of our decals without any coating, if you so require. This is how we apply them ourselves. They will just need careful handling to avoid any flaking or scratching of the unprotected ALPS inks.

Either ready clear coated or not these decals are still very thin and flexible. Despite this they do not tear easily.

DUPLICATE ITEMS:
On most of our 1/32nd scale sheets we have been able to include two of every item to help accommodate that whoops! factor. On a few of our 1/32nd scale sheets we have had room to include only two of every item with a significant area of white decal. These extra white decals can be used to help prevent any bleed through of underlying dark paint colours in the larger white decals area by the overlaying of the duplicate decals.

INCLUDED WITH EACH SHEET:
Each sheet comes with a placement guide, a brief history of the subject and full instructions on the handling and application of our ALPS printed decals.

SCALES OTHER THAN 1/32ND:
While our primary objective is to produce decals for 1/32nd scale slot car bodies, we have had a number of requests to resize our decals into other scales. While in practice we can resize our decals sheets by a simple overall percentage to produce a notional scale of anywhere between say 1/64th and 1/18th, there is no guarantee that the result will fit your intended body shell. Our decals are sized to fit a specific target body shell and a simple resize will reflect any distortions that were required to compensate for any inaccuracies in the original target model.

The 1/25th scale or any other non-1/32nd scale decals that we offer here on this web-site will have been sized to fit a specific body shell and are taken from from our master files and have not simply been rescaled from a larger, or even worse a smaller scale finished decal sheet.