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Alternative to BMF/ Imitation Silver Leaf


jwrass

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Thanks to all have replied to this post be it positive or not so much. I am working on a edit to the process to put to bed what I feel is a much superior effect to BMF Here a few reasons why I think it blows away BMF

1) You can manipulate the texture to pretty much what you desire

2) You don't have to take a knife to your substrate.... every time I see someone cutting on paint it makes me cringe.

3) You can patch in any area seamlessly.

Skip makes some very great points (Thanks Skip) The leafing process is so much easier than you think and not very time consuming at all. I'll break in down.

1) Brushing the size: 5 minutes.

2) Lying the leaf: 10 minutes.

3) Burnishing the leaf :10 minutes. DONE

I based these figures on doing both sides and front and rear windscreen trim. Emblems and door handles come out so clean as the leaf only sticks where the size was applied no cutting on the surface.

That's a total time of 25 minutes..... I'd pay good money to see someone lay that amount of BMF in that amount of time.

The most time consuming part of the process is waiting for the size to tack up for application

I used to use BMF and one day after doing some leaf on a Race Car I hauled out a body and gave it a whack.... there was no turning back. I personally will never use BMF again as IMO it's inferior to the leafing process.  

In closing. I was offering a alternative to BMF which is really quite simple. I was surprised by some of the blow back..... lets see we hone our skills to do many types of processes yet some are not open to trying a new process, which is fine by me, I personally can't wrap my brain around that type of thinking.... different strokes I guess. It's just another tool in the tool box.

Yes Skip and I have much experience in the process, However I agree with everything he wrote. He is right on

A bit of eye candy......

Here are a couple of examples of various types of leaf. This is actually a wooden Pizza spatula that I made into a Key Holder for my Daughter, Kandies, Pearl, Flake, Leaf and Freehand Pinstiping. I wish the pictures were clearer.. They are very clear in my pictures folder, However when I attached them here they are fuzzy. The fan design consists of three types of imitation leaf, From the middle out is Silver leaf with a Kandie lime green misted over the leaf. Next is gold and the outer rim is Copper. The freeform design is various colors of variegated leaf. Keys is the real deal.... Genuine 23 Karat Gold. Roughly $20 dollars worth 

Enjoy.... Jimmy "RASS"

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Edited by jwrass
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  • 3 weeks later...

Awesome tutorial! Do you have any photos yet of the silver leaf after you've finished burnishing it down? Would love to see it!

I bought some size some time ago to try with regular foil, I had been wondering about using silver leaf but hadn't found anyone using it to see what it looked like and I found so many different techniques of people using it picture frames among other things on You Tube.

Even if you use BMF or kitchen foil, silver leaf would still be useful for small things like door handles and the small clips behind the seats on the earlier Corvettes among other things that would be very hard to do with foil.

Does silver leaf have a nice shine when it's finished being burnished down? I'm building a couple unlimited air racer's and their propellers & spinners, as well as the canopy on one were polished aluminum. The propeller and canopy I wouldn't have a problem doing but foil, the spinner would be harder to make it look like one piece of metal, silver leaf might be the answer? I wouldn't have to have it highly polished, shiny would be nice. Because of health problems, I stay away from the metal paints.

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This was a really interesting tutorial.  I like the idea of not having to put a sharp blade on a good paint job!  If the leaf can just be pushed away this sounds like something I'd like to try next time around.

I have some super thin platinum sheet and I don't need it anymore.  I bet that would make for a real interesting novelty on my next model.  I like the idea.

By the way JR, that is some awesome work on a wooden spatula!

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  • 4 months later...

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