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Adding Bare-Metal Foil to a slot car isn't that hard. The following process took me about 30 minutes, including taking time to stop and snap some photos of the process.

What I recommend that you have on hand is the following:
Bare-Metal Foil (duh)
X-acto knife (or any hobby knife)
Plenty of extra blades
Toothpicks
Scissors


Inside the Bare-Metal Foil packet is a single sheet of foil and an instructions sheet. The instructions recommend that you take a #11 X-acto blade, run it along a sharpening stone, then begin cutting the basic shape of what you need off of the foil sheet. Hogwash. I used scissors to chop out a tiny portion that is a lot easier to work with, and I did not spend a few minutes grinding the edge of my blade before diving in.

What I set out to foil is a Mercedes emblem on the back of a 300 SLR, (just ignore that the car is pink :whistle: ) so I cut out a square of foil (with scissors) about twice the size of the area that I planned to cover.


I then cut out a rough circle that is again, larger than the emblem that I ultimately wish to cover. To do so, I merely ran the blade along the surface of the foil. It is so thin that you need not press to cut it. As the instructions state, simply allow the weight of the knife to cut the foil.


Peeling the circle that I cut out off of the paper backing wasn't necessarily hard, but not easy either. I just slid the edge of the blade under the foil and began carefully peeling it off. The foil likes to roll, so take time to stop and smooth it back out as you continue lifting it. Once I had the circle off of the paper, I placed it over the emblem.


Using a toothpick, I began pressing the foil against the emblem, taking care to mold it in to the details. It is possible to tear the foil while doing this, so don't put too much muscle behind it. Take time and continue rubbing the foil in. I don't suggest using anything that has too much of a point on it as that is sure to tear or cut the foil. A toothpick seems perfect for this task.


Once the foil was hugging the details of the emblem as best as I could get it, I turned back to the X-acto blade and carefully cut away the excess. Don't worry about ruining the paint job of the surrounding area. The foil does not take much pressure to cut, so you are basically just tracing along the edges with what happens to be a razor blade. The foil will cut. Even if you do go a bit heavy on an area and cut in to the paint, chances are that you won't be able to see your slip-up as it will be along the edge of where the foil meets the paint. Basically, this stuff is idiot proof!

The majority of the time spent applying the foil was spent in this trimming stage. Don't be afraid to swap to a new blade or two during this process. The worst thing that can happen is that your blade could go dull, catch on the foil, and rip it where you don't want it to rip. I cut a little bit away at a time until I was left with what looked good enough to me.


The only downside that I could find to using the foil is that my camera doesn't seem to like focusing on it. If that's the worst thing that happens, then it was money well spent. I had planned on painting this emblem, but it turned out to be much easier to just foil it. Had I painted it, I would have had to worry about runs wrecking my nice pink paint-job. No such worries here.

So don't feel intimidated by the foil. It's actually pretty simple to use. In fact, this was my first time ever using the stuff! :D

There are some good how-to videos about applying Bare Metal Foil on youTube.

One of the videos suggested that the adhesive used to make it has an effective shelf-life of about a year.

Using a #2 pencil eraser will cut down the application time immensely. You don't have to stress over the toothpick poking through

Yeah. Ok. That's the easy bit. It's wrapping bumpers, over riders and grills that bites my butt.

Embs

Thanks for taking the time to share this. Good info.

Do we get to see the baby pink Merc? :)

I am going to try this
what do you use to cover it? clear coat?

I think it would take a little bit more than pink, glittery, fluffy slot cars to crack the larger female market, somehow.

Perhaps you're right.

Might make for an interesting proxy class, though.


David.

I read that a clear/future coat on top of the foil will make it look dull and cloudy. If you want shiny it should be on top of the top layer, unless someone has experience with something that doesn't dull the foil.

I use Tamiya gloss clear over my bare metal foil. It does not go dull or cloudy. The foil looks no different with the clear on top. For slot cars you kinda need to clear over your foil. Because you are picking the car up all the time the foil tends to come off easily when handling it. So the clear keeps it stuck down.

Also for burnishing the foil down I use a combination of toothpicks & a cotton buds(the things you stick in your ear to clean them out).

Yeah Im with Ember, Foiling bumpers is not alot of fun.