I have now added the first vinyls to the Bachmann SouthWest Trains class 450 (ex-Silverlink class 350/1). I was a bit stuck for the right shade of blue to match the SWT blue on the vinyls so as a preliminary undercoat for any exposed edges, the inner end and the roof I used a Revell dark matt blue, then followed it with some Precision Paints First Group 'Barbie' blue, which has turned out to be an almost perfect match for the vinyls.

I also pre-painted the leading end of the roof with red and orange to roughly correspond with the Stagecoach 'swoops' so that the holes in the roof vinyl overlay for those colours where the vents go through would match.

I have applied the first vinyls to just the one side at the moment so I could assess which edges need to be pre-painted on the other coaches.The instructions say to apply the roof flashes first so I did that carefully, then added the unit numbers on the cab end, over the windscreens. While I was at it, I added a destination over the relevant windscreen.

There are a few small air bubbles present and I may try the previous method used for Electra Graphics to smooth the vinyl over any raised detail, that is, I'll try the hair dryer heat on it to see if I can improve things a little. Overall though the effect is quite good. From normal viewing distance I think it looks great.

One other thing I will be altering though is that front end sweep of the orange and red: the ERG version is set too low so will be cutting it off at the corner and hand-painting the remainder. The red stripe should intersect the lower part of the tail light and there should be a band of blue across the bottom of the cab front (already painted earlier when I did the roof, in fact!).