Utter Reckless Sign Making

[Erik Sine]

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Utter Reckless Sign Making

 

Got an opportunity to fabricate and install a reverse pan channel letter sign using the Reckless NC LED lines that we carry. 

 

Unlike most LED's on the market that are Constant Voltage, made in CHINA....unregulated, and short life for whites and especially color LED's OURS are ALL Constant Current, long life and of course rated for IP68...not that that was needed for this....but nice to have an know!  Here we used our Yellow/Amber, Red, and our Reckless High Powered White (Amazing 3% Light degradation in 15,000 hours from our testing in Project Tighty Whitey). 

 

I have to reiterate again, it's only been the last few years that The Sign Syndicate got into Light Source Sales since we started out testing for the electric sign industry.  We were amazed with our benchmarks on a few lines, and from someone who likes Neon over LED's I was impressed.  Neon is still my preference, there are only about 5% of what we've tested that I would ever use when it comes to LED's.  If you like LED's, then this is one of those lines.  We started selling Axiom LED's for bright high powered white, and soon after I became so impressed with NC LED, it soon followed.  I was asked for a couple of years to sell this line, and I finally gave in, here is a little of that "why".  I like selling only what I use, and know to be quality.  Their main focus was "eco", or constant voltage, I requested a constant current line when we first started testing, it wasn't something they focused on.  But after seeing results of other similar make up we soon saw NC LED exceed those that came before it.  When we finally picked up the line I wanted something even more different here in the U.S., I tailored a configuration that I thought best suited the needs of the American electric sign industry when it comes to LED's and what it was thirsty for.  A product that also does not help financially support those across the ocean that aren't exactly our enemies, but NOT exactly our friends either.

 

Enter the Reckless...

 

High Powered White, high grade/tier Samsung diodes, Constant Current, high standards of quality control from Korea (think Japan) and here in the US hence the name #teamncled 

 

All that put together and we get a 100% Sexy...Bad Ass module, it's disgusting I know. 

 

The Reckless is my baby, it's Team NC's Baby, and we're going to treat her right.  It appears in the last few months we've been doing almost too good of a job promoting her, and now many suppliers (reading this) are starting to flock to become carriers themselves.  Guess their feeling that that what they've been pushing and promising is just not all that, and the failures are hitting them hard.  But be assured, learning, seeing, and observing from what happens looking into the past with other mfg/supplier relationships, we've not going to let her be whored out and eventually cheapened  #TeamNCLED is going to be taking very good control with all standards when it comes to this particular product, and who can offer it.

 

What keeps great products going and preservation of that, is the team behind it.  It's another reason why I'm proud to be apart of it, it's not just a business but it's a "family" of individuals that are and will stay strong, and stay together. 

 

That said, I have to say, I'm very proud how this particular job came out.  It was going to have to be LED because of clearances, I could have made the "Orange" in Neon and I did think about it, EGL green pumped red.  But I REALLY, wanted to see what the 1/2 watt Amber modules could do for halo lighting.  From an optics standpoint, I love that the modules castings are the color of the light they will produce, no second guessing....easy!

 

The wall the signs were going on was pretty VERY much appreciated.  Flat, light colored, perfect for reflection.  We we're lucky, some walls in the shopping center were dark brown, NOT good for halo lighting unless you install with some flat white reflectors flush on the wall.

 

Easy wall to drill through, easy well enough access behind the wall but ALL Power supplies had to be centered on the wall because of access.  If this was a Neon sign, it would be dreadful behind that wall.  Behind the wall was one of our Union Elecom 120 watt (Dual Channel), and one 60 watt per sign, which totaled two signs.

 

At a glance.

 

Our Constant Current IP68 NC LED .48 watt Amber/Yellow

 

Our Constant Current IP68 NC LED .48 watt Red

 

 

The NC LED system engines, Union Elecom Power Supplies

 

 

The Sign Day Shots

 

 

Last but not least, and more important night shots to wrap it up

 

 

 

Right now just about all of the signs are LED only, and all white.  Some ugly gray looking white, cheap blue white, high kelvin I'm sure but sold as 6500K with a poor bin process, and probably 50¢ modules.  There is only one sign what has a nice white like our reckless, a national chain.  Other than that the colors involved for this sign REALLY make it stand out, which leads us to this. 

 

That's the point really, to stand out, to compete against our rival/competition (our customers too) and WIN!  Winning brings you more clients/customers and referrals, and MORE future work.

 

That is what you will get when your signs have our LED's integrated into them, it's all apart of "Making Long Lasting Channel Letters, and What It Takes" and the products are only going to get better...BELIEVE ME!

 

One thing you have or haven't noticed, we've NEVER sold LED's with marketing statement such as "More Energy Efficient...Saving the Planet..Better than Neon or Fluorescent Lamps", those are myths and mis-information, we just sell better LED's than those that claim they do.  This is also NOT my full time job, product sales is fun for me.  Not being my full time job mean something of value to me and should for everyone else reading this.  Not being full time for me means I don't have to lie or whore myself just to make a sale to float my boat.  MANY do that because it IS their full time job.  I'll just tell you it is a REALLY great product because we've tested it for years, and I myself use it.  I can't bullshit for sales, I never have, never will, I never have with signs and I sure as hell won't do it with components....I'm not the type who can look at myself in the mirror if I did.

 

"NOT made in CHINA!!!"

 

Go #TeamNCLED

 

[imanut]

Nice  job....as expected from you.  What was stroke of letters abd number of rows of leds?

[Erik Sine]

Gary, you're alive!

 

Everything was single stroke, except for the splat parts of the "O", I just looped those around basically double row and composed of about 6 modules.  for the Amber and partially red, I slightly twisted each module (as seen in the pic for) so I would get slightly more than 3 modules per foot for these 1/2 watt modules because the light output for colors is no where near Neon when it comes to LED's.  And unlike Neon, LED's were dependent on light bouncing back from the back side of each pan letter where as Neon is 360˙ and is not dependent on the reflection of the pan.

 

I did debate with myself to double stroke the amber, but I was starting to think I might block out too much light with so much space taken up on the poly carb.

 

For the whites, tightly stretched because those are high powered and no need to add more than needed.

 

On the strokes, 2" for the red, 3.5" on the Orange, the white about 2.75"

[bobchapa]

The backlit photos look outstanding. Well done on that project!
It is always great to see halo signs with enough lighting that it really makes them stand out (especially with multiple colors) instead of just a silly little border.

[Sign Lady]

Very nice!!  All of the colors look amazing, but the white is so crisp!  Do you have a price sheet you could send me??

[Erik Sine]

Thank You Angie.

 

The white is AMAZING.  I can't stress that enough, and most likely I'm probably sounding like a used car salesmen by now but I can't help it. 

 

I've seen many whites as we've been doing the testing for light comparison's since 2008, very few LED's impress me, and very few I would ever use as most who target 6500K rarely ever look white (poor/low bin target) , in fact they look poorly green, gray, and purple/blueish when they put it side by side with a real white such as our Reckless.  When you only hold one of those others in your hand by itself, it looks white and only because your eye has nothing to compare it too.

 

Very few look white, and even after achieving a white, rarely do they last as sold/promised.

 

So far, all who have tried keep using. 

 

 

Shoot me over your address and I'll show you what I'm talking about

[Sign Lady]

On 8/23/2016 at 10:50 AM, Erik Sine said:

Thank You Angie.

 

The white is AMAZING.  I can't stress that enough, and most likely I'm probably sounding like a used car salesmen by now but I can't help it. 

 

I've seen many whites as we've been doing the testing for light comparison's since 2008, very few LED's impress me, and very few I would ever use as most who target 6500K rarely ever look white (poor/low bin target) , in fact they look poorly green, gray, and purple/blueish when they put it side by side with a real white such as our Reckless.  When you only hold one of those others in your hand by itself, it looks white and only because your eye has nothing to compare it too.

 

Very few look white, and even after achieving a white, rarely do they last as sold/promised.

 

So far, all who have tried keep using. 

 

 

Shoot me over your address and I'll show you what I'm talking about

 

 

What we have noticed with the whites we have used is they do have a blue tint to them - I would LOVE to install something like that around here.  Folks would lose their minds because it would look so much better than anything else around here.  I will certainly use yours next set I have to do!!  I have never seen a white halo look like that.  You have a right to brag.  Ain't nothing wrong with that either.  That sign looks amazing.  Never seen a halo show up that far out from the letter and still be so crisp.  Most that you see are fairly bright right at the letter, but then just fade away to nothing.  I am very impressed with the way this radiates from the letters without losing any color at all.  Very, very nice job.  

[Erik Sine]

I don't have permission to talk about some national accounts but there is one in particular that is a furniture chain that uses Day Night Plex (which is the worst), and they build 8' letters all over the US.  They finally switched over from JT and Osram to us after a couple of years of either failure or too high a cost to compete to ours.  They use the Reckless 2's for these letters and they aren't going to build them any other way now.

 

Below the Orange is our NC LED Reckless white (3M tangerine), and Fitness, which face is 3M Gray Translucent vinyl series, the red is our NC LED Red.  In person the Gray looks almost white at night, no over exposure pic below as most LED mfg's will do, you can see this because the TV monitor is not over exposed, so what you see is what you get. 

 

 

 

I'll get these out today.

 

Thanks!

[imanut]

Eric..

 

Any false accusations to my demise are exaggerated.   Dont want to steal your thread, but, thanks for reminding me that neon is 360 degrees!  I'd forgotten that!  Ha.

 

However, again your sign is gorgeous, but to remind Pat, and others,  especially using led products, the background, as you stated is SO important!!

 

I came really close to buying a neon plant, with 15k pounds of glass.  Just the expense,  time to establish a going business was a bit too much for this time in life.  Would have been fun doing neon again.....and then I could compete with the last, best, and only bender post that I made.  Fun to teach again.   Sign companies here in TN are like Chicago, either I'm over qualified, or they found someone more experienced??

 

Again great sign.  For reference, what distance was your standoff on the letters?

[Sign Lady]

I was wondering where you were too!!  Good to see you on here!  Hope all is well.