The transfers:

The United States military developed a letter and number registration code system in order to ease the process of keeping track of their vehicles. These registration codes were placed on the vehicles in specific locations. Archer Fine Transfers has released a set of registration codes that come in two different sizes for various United States military trailers, workshops, passenger cars, motorcycles, armored cars, wheeled tractors, and tracked trailers.

The set comes packaged in a clear plastic bag with a paper identification label stapled at the top of the bag. The bag contains one sheet of transfers, one sheet of backing paper, an information sheet and a heavy blue paper insert to protect the sheet of transfers. The set provides enough transfers for several vehicles. The set does not come with an application instruction sheet. Instructions need to be obtained from the Archer Fine Transfers web site.

The transfers come on a 4 3/8" wide by 3 1/2" high carrier sheet. The transfers are nice and crisp and have no flaws or blemishes. I measured the transfers and the dimensions for each are as follows:

Large registration codes – 1/8" high by 1 5/16" up to 1 1/2" long

Small registration codes – 1/32" high by 5/8" up to 3/4" long

The registration codes come in pairs of two. The set comes with 14 different large sized registration codes for a total of 28 and 12 smaller registration codes for a total of 24.

The transfers provide markings which look very realistic when applied. Once applied they do not leave any silvering which can happen with water slide decals and they can be scratched and chipped if desired to provide a weathered look.The transfers come off of the carrier sheet very nicely and once applied the transfers look very realistic. I have provided a photograph of one of the large and one of the small registration codes that I transferred onto a piece of sheet styrene, that I painted olive drab, to show you the end result. The Archer Fine Transfers web site provides application instructions for their products. One detail I would like to see Archer Fine Transfers provide would be a product handling guide on their packaging warning not to touch the transfers with bare fingers. As a first time user it would be easy for a modeler to have the transfers stick to their fingers when handling them. When I researched a previous set, the first time I was exposed to dry transfers, I had some of the transfers stick to my fingers so I speak of this from personal experience.

Archer Fine Transfers owner Woody Vondracek informed me that later this summer he plans to have video tutorials on line on his web site.

Conclusion:

All in all this is a very nice set of dry transfers. Archer Fine Transfers continues to provide excellent products and this is just one of the many nice sets that are available. I am very impressed with this set and I would have no hesitation to recommend it to others or to obtain more sets for myself.

References:

Standard Catalog of U.S. Military Vehicles 1940-1965
Thomas Bernt
Krause Publications
ISBN: 0-87341-223-0

U.S. Armor Camouflage and Markings World War II
Jim Mesko
Squadron Signal Publications

Archer Fine Transfers