Nuts!

Where did I get this utterly insane idea from to populate the number boards on the two SVL switchers?

The numbers are only slightly wider than the blade of the utility knife, and I ended up cutting them out with the fine blade in an Exacto knife. This doesn't bode well for my ideas to renumber some of my German freight cars. Since European car identification numbers are substantially smaller than what's common in the U.S., most of the numbers I will need to piece together have the same size that drove me almost insane here. It did get a little bit better with practice, but I also grew more impatient.

Does anyone have any tips or tricks for working with really small decals such as individual numbers in tiny fonts?

Update June 13, 2016:
... and looking at prototype photos of CNW 1078, the number boards are actually not populated either! Sigh. I could have saved myself a lot of trouble here...