Since the mid-1970s, Custom Painted Vehicles (Franksville, WI) has produced custom-painted and airbrushed trucks, motorcycles and virtually anything else with an internal-combustion engine and wheels. Over the past three years, the company has ramped up its vehicle-wrap production, and it ultimately opened Graphic Wraps, a separate division dedicated to vinyl-clad vehicles.
To tout the company’s services to would-be Badger State clients, Steve and Jay Wright, the brothers who co-own the company, elected to wrap the shop’s 2006 Chevy Silverado pickup truck for added exposure. Steve designed the job using Adobe Creative Suite 5.
“The purpose of the design was to be wild, edgy and sporty,” Steve said. “Racing stripes run down the vehicle’s entire length. An Aurora Graphics design provided the focal point, with a fire-like texture that reflects the quality of our work.”
In addition to being used on sales and service calls, he said, “The truck sits along our shop’s storefront directly off of I-94, which runs through Racine. Displaying it in such a high-visibility location has helped us sell several jobs.”
Graphic Wraps produced the approximately 250-sq.-ft. job with 3M’s IJ180C-10 Controltac vinyl with Comply v3 air-release technology on a Mutoh ValueJet 1304 54-in.-wide, four-color printer. On the windows, Graphic Wraps used 3M’s Scotchcal™ 8171 50% perforated film. 3M’s glossy-finish, 8518 topcoat, applied with a Seal Pro 62 laminator, will keep the wrap burning bright. A liquid clearcoat safeguards the window graphics.
To install the wrap, Graphic Wraps seamed the vinyl on the door seams and panel edges; they installed vinyl to the vehicle’s sides horizontally, and vertically on the doors.