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need suppliers please of sheet materials?
Hi, I am in East Sussex, and I have started my own business in the signmaking trade. I have taught myself to use flexisign, and i have a summa d60 cutter. I am building a stock of materials, i.e vinyl, board such as correx etc. I have a done quite a few jobs now, mainly car and van based work, and less on the sign side. I have done one shop sign, in which i used polycarbonate conservatory roof sheeting. The fluted texture didnt matter as it added to the effect of the style of shop. But now i am getting more enquiries for shop signs etc. Basically I need help in learning about the kinds of materials I should be using, I dont use metal letters or anything like that yet, just cut vinyl. So what sort of things should I look at for making signs, and where is the best place to buy them. I have read a lot of posts on here, and there are lots of different things mentioned such as dibond, alucolour, foamex, foam x , foamalux. what are the differences etc. I really hope you can help me. Also is there any kind if training course I can so for vinyl graphics, as so far i have taught myself.
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4 Replies
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Hi Matt.
thats quite a comprehesive first post. We usually have to coax people to give us a bid more info,
Any way welcome aboard, Im sure you will find the boards invaluable.
I would however suggest that you post a separate “hello” in the say hello forum, then ask the questions one at a time, in the relevant forums, I think that way, you will get a better response….Peter
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Welcome a-board Matt !
Dibond is a sandwich of two aluminium sheets with a core of polyethylene, it is produced by Alcan (http://www.dibond.com). It is used for quality projects that need to last, indoor and outdoor.
The best thing I like about Dibond is that it is staright and it stays straight.
It is available in a few colours.
Alucolour is about the same … only cheaper.Foamex, Foamalux and (to make the list longer) Forex (also Alcan) are plastic sheets of about 2 – 20 mm thick. These materials are used very much by signmakers.
I use it (forex) only for indoor (tradeshow) jobs (because of the B1 fire-rating) and for shortterm (<3 years) outdoor jobs.
It can be cut with a stanley knive (see Robs demos) and it is also not very expensive.Well hope this helps a bit (… and that I was correct about everything)
Good luck and dont forget to make pictures of your work and post them!
JJ
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thanks guys for your advice, Sorry for flooding my first post, :), im keen to learn haha, I will try and spread out my questions,
Can u suggest a good place to supply me with dibond, as i rang one place and it seemed very expensive. -
I’m pretty sure Righton do di-bond and some cheaper generic stuff (righton.co.uk) as well as the major plastics suppliers (amari, cox and probably europoint).
All I will say, is di-bond in general isn’t "cheap" – but appears reasonably good value for what you get considering the resale value.
Price it against 2 or 3mm white aluminium & you’ll see what I mean!
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