Illuminated Signs

[Kevin Flowers]

Very nice work Nigel, always makes a change from doing run of the mill work

Kevin

[Robert Lambie]

love those signs mate.. 😉

the second looks very small. what size is it?

both work well and look great.. did you make the edge lit sign yourself?
fold & essemble engrave etc..

i did a 10mm reverse engraved sign using a v-shaped router bit. looked great.
because of the shape of the bit when lit. it is caught very well in the shape of the text/engraving.
not sure that made sense… 🙄
😆

[Nigel Fraser]

Rob,

It’s 500x250mm overall and 40mm thick. So yeh it was pretty fiddly, hence the laser cut acrylic&steel to avoid the tool radius on the corners.

I know what you mean, when you use a v-router bit on the back it almost gives the text a bevelled look from the front when lit.

I don’t have the skills or equipment to make up the stainless cases, so have to sub that out to a local metal shop who do all the folding, tig welding and polishing for me.
I just get to assemble the electrics, and engrave the panels. I have a little 25w Epilog laser here which is great for the detailed text that they have on some of the panels (some of them go down to 15point size)

Nigel

[Robert Lambie]

where do you buy your leds from.. paul davenport uses them a fair bit.
do you use them often? and do you think they are as bright or simular to that of neon?

i think they are a great altenative.. but i know very little about the electrical side of our game 😕

[Nigel Fraser]

I actually end up getting them from either RS components or Maplin electronics normally, because the customer never gives me enough lead time to source them elsewhere !
I know amari plastics neon division does various types from the big names in the business, but these are more the “strip” type leds without any lens casing. I use the std type for this job because the lens focuses the light with much more intensity into the acrylic sheet.
I was looking for some LED christmas lights the other day and came across this site http://www.superbrightleds.com which seemed pretty cheap (US site so don’t know if they will supply to uk), I use a mixture of blue and green 5mcd 15 degree LEDs in the casino signs which I think perform very well for that application.
Undoubtedly you get more light output from either compact fluorescent or neon tube but these would have to be mains powered of course. I could probably use more leds in the unit and get as bright or maybe even brighter than the neon but it would sap the power out too quick – so it was a compromise really.
These signs look great in their own environment which is only dimly lit surroundings, but they would need more intensity if used outdoors etc. I think.

I looked at using white LEDs for the illumination of the s/s wall sign shown here too, but tests proved that they just couldn’t produce enough light for that application. I really wanted to use them too, ‘cos the whole sign would only have been about 12-15mm thick then which would have looked pretty cool.

To sum up, I think that LEDs have a lot of potential in the sign business in future, but as far as replacing neon I think they have some way to go yet. You just need too many of them in builtup letters etc to achieve the equivalent brightness in my opinion anyway.

They are however absolutely fab for christmas lights, as they last practically forever and don’t mind the temp changes outdoors and are virtually indestructible – just a pity I can’t find any to buy 🙁

Nigel

[Martin Pearson]

Nice looking signs Nigel, do you have any trainning in the electrical field or have you just learned a little to allow you to do this sort of work?

[Nigel Fraser]

No formal training Martin, I have always had an interest/understanding of electronics of various types, so I just get by with that old learning curve ever growing !

[Nicola McIntosh]

fantastic signs nigel!! 😆 😆

i personally would not know where to start, on making these type of signs!! great to see !! (maybe a wee post on it later on?)

Nicola

[Simon Clayton]

They look Great..
Where’s the transformer for the neon sign, i presume its on the other side of the wall, did that not cause a problem with the cosmetics, as there not that nice to have hanging on your wall.
Just out of interest what sort of cost was involved, (if that’s not too rude) around £340.00?

Simon

[Nigel Fraser]

Simon,

The neon sign has a very slim electronic transformer inside the case shown in the pic. so it’s all in one neat unit and just needs a mains supply.

You’re guesstimate was not far off – they were actually £295+vat each as there were three very similar units.

Nigel

[Simon Clayton]

Cheers Nigel,
That’s not bad at all (Not VAT registered so that’s included) 😕

Who supplies this type of unit, its been a long time sinse i did anything like this,
most of my customers would have a fit, “How much, its not very big, etc etc….” as you can image… Shame.

Simon

[Nigel Fraser]

Simon,

I take it you mean the electronic transformer ? Which is a “Hansen” unit available from Specialist Neon Supplies or any good neon shop. It was the slimest I could get hold of for that job. I made an extra unit for my own demo use but never got round to assembling it (image below) !!
One day maybe…

A lot of my customers would have a fit aswell, but these people are kind of in the big money advertising business where image is everything and so its not so critical to them. I wish I could have more like them though !

Nigel

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[elitesigns]

Nice work, glad to see a bit more illumination on the site.
What are you using for the edge lit bases ?

[Robert Lambie]

i agree craig..
theres actualy a few areas that the site lacks in.. something ide love to get round to sorting out.. times a killer for me.

i have a demo. that ive had for a while. infinished though.. its building an alluminium light box. i will have to get round to geting it finished.
even at that though. i regard this as pretty basic..

just incase:-
if any of you electrical guys out there dont mind taking some pics of the internal process of an illuminated letter or the like ide love to use it in the form of a demo on the site. giving full recognition to the person & their company for doing the demo of course.
theres just not enough of it at hand & im sure it will help tons of us understand this side of things better. 😀
if anyone decides to subit a demo all you have to do is take the pictures and save them as a number. then type the text for each picture and send it to me. ill crop & chop and put it all together on the site for you… 😉

[elitesigns]

i’m just in the middle of some more halo lit s/steel letters, would gladly take some pics of the building process, you can have pics of making the neon as well if you want.

[Robert Lambie]

i would be delighted of anything you wish to submit mate.. the more the merrier.. thank you very much 😉

[Gordon Forbes]

OOOOhhh buyin from RS pricey.

Lovely work all the same a few of the guys at work know all about led’s etc.
A bit beyond me as you say the ever present learning curve which just comes with time and experience.

They sure look smart.

[john6512]

we have just started to import a stainless steel range of high end torches which we then laser engrave, and one of their products is a very high power single and multicolour LED base – we have hada couple of samples which look very good. The LED’s used in the torch are also the brightest in the world (so they tell us). There a German company that I cant pronounce or spell but initial indication for us for promotional branding is very good – as a sideline, the LED bases might have some future in this type of work (well it worked for us – laser engraving in to 10mm acrylic looked very impressive)