gtrepair,

The stencil machine is an old Ideal stencil cutter. It cuts 1/4 inch letters but unfortunately, the machine weighs about 50 pounds and is large (you can do a search online and see a modern day version). It looks like one of the old type label makers with a big wheel mounted on top of the machine.

We buy vinyl stencil material from a number of different glass etching sites on the web. The vinyl is adhesive backed so it sticks to the front of the brass letter stencil box while pressed against the window to etch the VIN. The stuff comes in rolls - usually 12 inch minimum width so it has to be cut down to use. We cut 2 stencils per vehicle.

The long and short of the story is that it's a pain in the rear but still better than manually inserting the brass letters for each vehicle. The only requirement is to have the dealers email the VIN's a couple of days before hand so we can precut them.

There has to be a better way but I haven't discovered it yet.

Mike Burstein
Dominion Windshield Repair Inc

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