Making Bike Decals with the Cricut

Hi everyone. It's Alanna from sixthreezero. Today we are going to show you how to make a custom decal for your bike using the Cricut. So if you watched our last decal video, we showed you how you can remove a decal and then apply your own custom decal. This time we're going to show you how to design and print your own decal using the Cricut. And we're going to do this for our decal winner, Michelle.

We've already coordinated a design with her, so we'll show you how we're going to print it out, apply it. And she has an Around the Block, so we're going to use this Around the Block to figure out the dimensions.

The first thing you want to do is measure the top tube to make sure the decal isn't too small or too large. So the main decal that we are printing today is going to go on the top tube here, and we want to make sure it doesn't wrap around too much so that you can still read it and see it clearly from the side.

So I'm going to start just by measuring here. And it's about an inch of visibility here from the side, but just to be safe we'll probably make the decal three-quarters of an inch. And the length doesn't really matter, we'll just make sure that it matches up to the height. And you could go all the way across, but if you're just keeping it straight, we'll probably keep it around eight to nine inches.

Okay. So before we get started, a few things you'll need are the Cricut Maker, or any of the Cricuts, actually, with the cutting blade. Vinyl, we have white vinyl. Transfer paper, grip mat. This thing that cuts straight lines, I'm not sure what it's called. And then I'm using these Cricut tools that just make it easier to get the vinyl cleared of all the excess that you won't be needing. And of course your laptop or whatever device you're using to create the design with and print it out.

So, here I have Michelle's design, Chelle's cruiser with the turtles and the flowers. And now we're going to import this into the Cricut Design Space. So you go open up the Cricut Design Space, upload your image here. I'll select complex, just because it gets a little detailed around the flowers. And here's a preview.

I saved it without a white background, but if it has a white background, you can just click anywhere that you don't want white background or any color background, and then continue. You want to select save as cut image. And then select it. You can see I tested it out a few times. Insert. And here it is.

So it's pretty big. We are going to change the dimensions to 0.75 inches tall. And you can see that it comes out to about seven and a half inches long. So that's perfect because we wanted to keep it under eight inches, so you don't have to curve it with the tube. So this will be our tube decal. And we also wanted to do some extra decals of just the flower and turtle design for the Kroozie cup holder. So I saved that as well as a separate design. Same process, continue. There it is. And insert it.

For this, two by two inches is perfect for the Kroozie cup holder. So this is about two by two and a half, let's make it a little smaller. That looks good. So let's do one of these. And maybe just one more for the chain guard. So copy paste that same design. Make this one an inch. Actually, let's flip it horizontally. We'll do two. She can put these wherever.

Now, this is everything that we're going to print. We have some sixthreezero stickers that we're going to throw in as well that are already printed, so I'll show you those in a bit. And now we're ready to make the decal. So, first got to plug in the Cricut. Okay, so I have all the designs uploaded ready to cut. So I'm just going to click make it. They're all selected as cuts.

And you can see that it tries to optimize space here, and you can tell exactly how much final you're going to need. So just a little over two by 11. So let's say two and a half by 11 and a half inches of vinyl. So, going to cut that out. This type of cutting tool makes life so much easier. And the fact that the vinyl has this grid on the back, so that's going to be five squares. One, two, three, four, five.

So, this is more than enough vinyl for our decals. Just going to dust it off. Okay, now we're going to apply the vinyl to the grip mat. So you want to make sure that the vinyl is on the grip mat exactly as it's pictured on the Cricut Design Space, so at the very top. Smooth it out. Okay, the grip mat is ready with the vinyl. It's loaded, clear space for printing.

And now we can go back to the Design Space. You choose first your material, we're using vinyl. And we have all our tools loaded. We only need the fine point blade, which is here in this slot. Mat's loaded, and now you just press the load button. There it goes. It only takes a few minutes. Oh, now it's ready.

So while this is printing, I'll show you some new stickers that we've got printed. These weren't printed with the Cricut, but you could potentially print stickers like this if you get the printable vinyl. So we have the, your journey, your experience sticker. I think this one's my favorite. We also have it in this color combo.

Another sticker. I like this one a lot and I have this t-shirt too, I think it's my favorite of the t-shirts. Pedaler stickers for the pedaler members. This one, I'm wearing this t-shirt today, but under the sweatshirt. This one's cool for the chain guard or some small area like that. So yeah, new stickers. Maybe we'll give some away.

Okay, it's done cutting, so now we'll see if it turned out okay. Just unload there. Oh yeah, it looks pretty good to me. Okay, so we'll peel it off. Okay. So you probably can't see anything right now, so I'm just going to go ahead and peel off the excess vinyl. So first I'm going to start by peeling off the outline, that'll give us a better idea of how it all looks. And the trick, especially when you're working with these smaller cuts, is to, I guess, peel it really close at a really tight angle and very slowly.

Okay, so I have the decal all separated from the rest. It does get a little tricky, especially with the smaller flowers. So if you're doing this at home, I definitely recommend avoiding any little cutouts like that and just stick to solid graphics, but it turned out okay. I really like how it looks, I hope Michelle likes it. And so now we're going to add this transfer tape, which will make it easier for her to apply it to her bike.

So I'm just going to cut the same amount as I did for the vinyl. So, I have that. And this is just clear tape. Apply the transfer tape. Okay, so all the air bubbles are out. I think I really got it stuck onto the transfer tape. And now I'll just cut between the different decals so they're separated. You probably can't see it too clearly, because it's a white on white, but let's just hold it up against the Around the Block to see how the size is. Okay, so it looks like a good size. It's not too tall, the length is good, and there it is.

So, when Michelle applies it or when you apply your own decal, you want to do the same thing when you peel off the backing, just keep it very low to the decal and peel as slowly as possible, especially if you have smaller cuts like this to make sure that they stay on the transfer tape. Make sure that you have it aligned as you want, and you can use painter tape, like I said in the last video, to make sure that you get it in the right spot.

So that's how you can make your own decal with the Cricut for your bike or your accessories. And like I said, that was a giveaway. So Michelle won our giveaway for the decal. This is a paneer that we actually gave away on Instagram that someone won and we're sending out today. We do different giveaways every week on our different social media channels. So make sure you're following us on Instagram at underscore sixthreezero underscore, here on YouTube and on Facebook.

And we also have a pedalers group for sixthreezero owners only. And this week we're giving away a free bike. So if you have a sixthreezero, make sure you're in that group, you can find all the links in the description. And have fun with your bike. Send us any pictures that you take if you make your own decals, we'd love to see them. And remember, it's your journey, your experience. Enjoy the ride.