Painting and cresting

ChakaZulu

New member
I'm trying to make some prettier arrows. At some point I'm going to foot some, but my skills with a saw are fairly poor, so I'm starting with dipping and painting.

Started with some bright red paint, thinned with about 1/3 white spirit and poured into a piece of plastic tubing. Then dipped the arrows. Dried to a lovely glossy smoothness. Unfortunately the masking tape I was using to get a clear line at the top has let some paint through so the effect isn't quite as good as I'd hoped. A black line around the top of the red has been done and now I'm going to sand the shafts a little to remove excess.

Anyone got any tips/tricks for decorating arrows?
 

darthTer

Active member
Supporter
Ironman
American Shoot
When I did my woodies....I used copious amounts of narrow masking tape & simply painted them with a brush and model paint.

It was time consuming, but fun to do....

The results came out quite well:


 

downswalker

New member
Here's my attempt with those well-known fletcher's tools of old; Corel Draw and an inkjet printer. The cresting is printed on to some inkjet-printable waterslide transfer paper, applied to the (walnut-stained) arrows and varnished over when completely dry.


The arrows aren't as bent as they look (yet). The lens on my camera has a touch too much barrel distortion when used at this distance and I don't have time today to fix the picture.

I don't yet know how durable these are likely to be. Time will tell. There's some mottling of the solid colours, but the transfer paper is sufficiently costly for me not to want to chuck sheets and sheets of it away while I get this absolutely right if, indeed, it's possible to do so.
 

gwynn

New member
Here's my attempt with those well-known fletcher's tools of old; Corel Draw and an inkjet printer. The cresting is printed on to some inkjet-printable waterslide transfer paper, applied to the (walnut-stained) arrows and varnished over when completely dry.

Very nice..... and with the Pompey crest!
 

downswalker

New member
Thanks Gwynn. In order to get the design to look right when the transfer is applied to the shaft, I had to make it look a little wider than intended when printed out flat on the transfer paper.

The advantage of preparing transfers on my computer is that I can fill the screen (a 22" one) with the design and see what I'm doing.

I'm intending to have a go at making a cresting machine. I suppose 'lathe' would seem to be the word nearest in meaning to what I have in mind, out of various bits as and when I can acquire them.
 

SVL

The American
Fonz Awardee
Ironman
American Shoot
Unfortunately the masking tape I was using to get a clear line at the top has let some paint through so the effect isn't quite as good as I'd hoped.
Try special Tamiya masking tape. My husband uses it for model making and it really works. I usually give my arrows a thin varnish layer before doing the dipping and cresting.

I have also used decal paper and safmat and once on the shaft a thin varnish layer gives extra protection.
 
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