To get 'er done I used a few things. First I bought a scanner at Goodwill for $7 and hooked it up to an old XP box (no newer drivers!!) and scanned the trims.
After doing some very minor rotations on the images to line them up perfectly, I needed to vectorize them for use in CAD. Not so much as a direct copy, but rather a guide to where to place the new text and graphics. First I tweaked on the contrast and brightness to make the text stand out from the gray background:
Then I loaded the image into Inkscape, a free tool that cutter plotter owners rant and rave about. It will trace bitmaps and text, which can then be saved as a DXF.
After I converted all the required characters, I merged them with the converted scans and mechanical drawing. I had to bring in the scan in three pieces, they all converted a bit differently so it looks a bit messy in some areas where they overlap. In many cases I improved on the original placement.
The spacing between the letters was all over the map, so I would line up a word vertically best I could and then drag the letters left and right until they matched.
