Proper Decal Placement?

Hey All.

My '73 850 is being painted as we speak.

There seems to be a wide variety of placement for the "850 Commando" decals that go on the side covers.

Where is the "proper" place?

Thanks for the help!

davidpnorton said:

Hey All.

My '73 850 is being painted as we speak.

There seems to be a wide variety of placement for the "850 Commando" decals that go on the side covers.

Where is the "proper" place?

Thanks for the help!

Click to expand...

Not crooked. :mrgreen:

or upside down . . . haha.

i have seen more centered & I have seen hugging the top a bit more.

Level. Put the covers on the bike and mark a level line with blue masking tape. Check a bunch of pictures and get the best idea for placement. Nothing set in stone here, except for level. It seems that no two covers ride exactly the same. Some are level, most swoop up and when people apply to match the contour of the cover, the lettering swoops up too. Same with the tank. Mount then mark.

I don't think there is any rule for this. If level with the ground sometimes the look is not pleasing to the eye because of nearby straight lines (like the seat chrome strip) so a slight compromise is needed. I think some work needs to be done first with adding or subtracting rubber buffers too to have the bottom of the tank and top line of the sidecovers at least close to level. (The earlier pre-71 type sidecovers are very tough to have look right just because of the way they are. Level doesn't look right to me and neither does aligned with the top of the sidecover on these.)