Quality Long Life Channel Letters

[Erik Sine]

Quality Long Life Channel Letters

What does that take?

The short answer is....always use the best light source according to the project application.

I've been busy and took some time away from the Sign Syndicate to take care of a few accounts & live real life. I decided to maintain two good accounts and shut down my shop all the while turning down work from my regular clients and referrals until the jobs were done. The good thing was, I had some good loyal clients who waited for me until these projects were over.

I had over 250 channel letters ranging from 12" to 46" and I did all of them myself and by hand instead of subbing them out. Why? I wanted something to do!

On one of the accounts which I'll post soon I used LEDs for the obvious reasons, the stroke is too thin for Neon components, but there is something really awesome about these LEDs that I had a personal hand in but that will be a separate thread I'll post later. But for now I'm going to talk about this one, which is focused on Neon illumination.

Neon illumination what???

A request by the client who owns a large national high end furniture chain that stems from the west coast to the east coast. I did their first job which was a entirely new location a couple of years ago which I posted here. They came to me by referral and they wanted Neon, NOT LED. They were real specific, reason been IS...they heard all the marketing claims made by sign companies who in turn heard it from the LED manufacturers about saving energy, prolonged life, yadda yadda over fluorescent lamps & Neon. A very topic we discussed in a topic "General LED Channel Letters On The Rise". They had a lot of signs made and retrofitted and well.......time went by and all the failures started to happen across multiple states in their wall signs and pylon signs. Enough was enough, they wanted to go back to light sources that they know always worked and never let them down , and that brought me to a group of stores right here in San Diego. They were making a name change re-brand over so I had to remove all the existing signs which were Neon illuminated. They were installed right for the most part and they didn't really have issues over time. I just improved what was used before, shorter runs, better material, making sure all circuits were properly loaded and going from single halo-phosphate (6500K) lamps to Tri-phoshor coated lamps. My first job for them I used FMS Neon's BL6500 in 12mm, I just continued that for this job.

Wow, why 12mm? The Sign faces are day/ night, 3M perf over white. Using 12mm the appearance looked like 6500 white behind white acrylic, and it just a little more load than using 13mm. Seriously, it's that bright. I just happened to put these signs where a lot of the competitors also used 3M perf faces. They used LEDs, we used Neon, the result is now like someone sprinting past a jogger....with the jogger jogging backwards.

No competition.....Truly!

Using the Tri-Phosphor lamps each letter will be uniform in it's entirety, no need to worry about any individual letter light output degradation. When you have 15' of linear lamp for a letter you only have one single light source, or two depending on how you break it down per letter. For LEDs you would have over 67 individual modules with over 134 individual diodes that can break down, degrade, have irregular lumen maintenance and or fail showing uneven lighting over the years, which is not good for a high end furniture store This high end furniture chain wanted none of that, nor do I, especially with the spec of the sign having day night faces. Now, If I could have done some things different I would have used the Axioms AXLE 9XB's for one of the signs that was on a tilt up wall, that one would have been perfect because some of the letters also had a 1.5" stroke and the stroke was real small for the field installation as well is hitting rebar almost every 8", after all the Axioms are one of the rare LEDs thats as bright a 13mm Tri=Phosphor lamp running on 60ma. The Axiom AXLE9XB LEDs would be perfect, who wouldn't want Nichia of Japan LEDs in their sign? But, again...it was Neon specific so it just took longer to install, no biggy!

Back to the illumination at night, it's even, it will stay even, the Tri-Phosphor lamps will stay whiter longer over time than the standard 6500 white. As if 6500 white didn't already stay white long enough. But Tri-Phosphor Whites can be 2 to 3 times brighter and stay white longer 2 to 3 times longer over time before the phosphor coats break down.

I had a fun time on this project, 6 sign locations, plenty of 3'x16' monument aluminum faces and smaller to go with it. I had my kids who wanted summer money helping out in trim capping, channel letter fabrication, sign removal and installation.

I can't post pics of all sign locations so I'll just keep it simple and it would just be redundant, I've posted this job before but on the initial job, this is more of the existing store chain locations making a rebrand.

I'll start from the beginning.

The removal

My Second oldest getting involved

Patterns on the wall

Always double nut the system ground, bottom ground for the panel, top for the tranny!

Plenty of head room for installation

Part of my work organization

Racks and boxes of Neon

Load Plan

Silicone GTO & electrode caps

Letters and GTO up! C'mon Neon

Day time shot

Night time shot

How the competition looks at night

[Erik Sine]

Sign Removal

Pattern up!

Drilling Time

Double nut and tranny time

Lots of room once again, I got lucky!

My Axiom LED makeshift work light, from a previous post

FMS BL 6500 Neon up

Me

Neon up, humid, and raining!

Perforated faces with Plasco Trim Cap. Plasco Trim Cap which is sold on this site is so easy to fabricate with a 10 year old can do it!

The BlueTooth Jawbone Jambox to keep me whistling while I work in the crawl space. The cool thing is it also works as a wireless phone speaker and mic so I can also talk while I work

[Erik Sine]

These are pics from a huge four sided freeway tower monument sign structure.

A whole lot of crap going on!

Still a lot of head room

Check this out, for some other sign I guess the installer didn't want to bother with junction box

Neon Transformer Boxes used as a circuit just to have the primary brought to another area but the transformer primary was NOT disconnected. Lazy Installer using this as a passthru rather than hook up a new primary line

Disconnect switch for the Neon Transformer Box

Drilling away!

Packing up!

Monument sign panel fabrication

The tilt up wall installation, yeeeeee!

This is one of those jobs that obviously take a little more time in the field and less in the shop but in the end the customer/consumer will have electric advertising in channel letters illuminated with a conventional light source in neon that will last the ages in brightness and lifetime, and remain uniform with a lamp that is 360˚ in light output

RETURN ON INVESTMENT!!! THE REAL NUMBERS

The average large sign is composed of 218.5 linear feet of Neon. Spread across three 15,000kv, and two 9,000kv Transformers.

Logo Box 34.5' in 15mm x 3 watts per foot = 103.5 watts

Channel Letters 184' in 12mm x 4 watts per foot = 736 watts

Total = 839 watts

839 watts x 8 hours a day x 365 days a year x $.15 kwh / 1000 (power correction) = $367.48 annual cost of operation if left on for 8 hours a day

$367.48 a year??? Not bad at all for that brightness, dependability and all around Bad Assness!!!

These are real numbers that represent real values, no mis-information nor mis-characterization of Neon consuming 6 watts or 12 watts per foot like some LED manufacturers and even electric sign companies like to scam their consumers to sell a project from something that consumes almost just as much power and won't be as bright when used according to the LED manufacturers specs for spacing.

Light Source manufacturers and sign companies can't bloat or bullshit figures here on The Sign Syndicate, it's not allowed and there are WAY to many professionals composed of electrical engineers and individuals that peak in various fields of the electric sign industry. Those that truly understand what it is they do when it comes to electric signs can verify the above figures discussed in this topic.

FINAL THOUGHTS

So......do you have the "know how" to produce and install Neon illuminated Channel Letters putting yourself in a category that separates yourself from other companies or are you stuck being just another phone number taped to someones wall to call along with those limited choice companies that also just "peel and stick" fabricating "un-custom" signs for the consumer....only able to turn a commodity instead of customs signs which is exactly what our trade magazines and sign associations have helped create in this industry?

If the answer is only LED "peel and stick" then your limiting your customer to more options this industry has to offer/available because you yourself are limited and you're also taking away sign longevity that they could be there for them to expect from a professional and this industry.

[imanut]

HEy, from that bottom picture, you've aged a bit running the SS.

[Erik Sine]

isn't that what happens to everyone in the sign industry?

[LiteGirl]

Sweet job and account sign guy!

[Mike1983]

Great work Eric, and fantastic documentation of the process. Amazing how the neon has sufficient lumen output to really pop the black faces to stunning white at night. Nice job!

[Mike1983]

Great work Eric, and fantastic documentation of the process. Amazing how the neon has sufficient lumen output to really pop the black faces to stunning white at night. Nice job!

[imanut]

Mike - amazing? How can you suggest that when he used FMS tubing!! It was a forgone conclusion!! Glad you folks are still taking care of the neon world out there. Now if we just had more professionals like Eric doing the layouts and installs - all the while running for President - then the world would be a good and happy place again.

gn