Archer rivet decals for freight cars

[spr1955]

I did a search for Archer rivet decals and most related to bridges so wondering if anyone has experience (good or bad) with archer freight car rivet decals ?   If you have wondering about ease of use and how it looked after paint.

TIA

Dave

[peteski]

Yes, those have been successful used on steam loco and tender shells among other applications.  I'm sure others will chime in.  I also thought that Archer either stopped making them or even went out of business. Hopefully that's not the case.

If you click on the "search" button towards the top left of the page (not the "search" field on the upper right) then search for "archer rivet decal", you will find several treads showing how they are used.

Also, your question is not scale-specific but more about scratchuilding/detailing techniques.

[spr1955]

They are still around, maybe bought by someone but I don't know.  Website is dated 2024.   https://www.archertransfers.com/products/freight-car-rivets-n-scale

Thanks for the pointers.

[Rivet Miscounter]

Interesting...

Archer Is Now Open Under New Management
DIRECT SALES ONLY. Archer Fine Transfers are now available only from this website. Given the surge in inflation, we decided to stop selling to dealers instead of raising our prices to accommodate the middleman.

Good news, hope it's legit.

[robert3985]

I did a search for Archer rivet decals and most related to bridges so wondering if anyone has experience (good or bad) with archer freight car rivet decals ?   If you have wondering about ease of use and how it looked after paint.

TIA

Dave

Man, THIS is good news!  I had a conversation just a couple of days ago mourning the loss of these invaluable surface detail decals!

I've used them for various projects including applying louvers and bridge rivets.  They work excellently, but the decal film is very thin and must be handled carefully.  The plus quality is that because the film is thin, it virtually disappears (effectively disappearing) after applying Micro-Sol and painting.

I haven't looked at my bridge projects under a microscope, but to the naked eye and in close-up photos, I don't see any film at all.

I found the Archer "bridge rivets" in N-scale to be a bit small for the bridge I built, so I went with the larger rivet decals that Micro-Mark made on some future projects (I don't think they make them any longer) because the sheets were bigger (more decals), but I could have used a larger scale's rivets by Archer to do the same thing. (EDIT) Micro-Mark still makes a large sheet of HO scale surface details, some of which may be appropriate for N-scale.

Photo (1) - Lincoln Hwy Bridges in Echo Canyon under construction using Archer Bridge Rivets on the top girder plates on the nearest bridge:


Anyway, thanks for letting us know that Archer surface detail decals are available once more!  Yup...I'll be ordering more for sure, so that means I endorse them!

Cheerio!
Bob Gilmore

[SP-Wolf]

I used Archer rivets on my SP dynamometer car - they worked great










Thanks,
Wolf