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Korber House Sign: Carved and ready for paint - November 2006

This is a sign we finished carving recently and I decided it would be a good sign to show all the different types of paint that we use and how we put it on layer by layer to create a finished carved sign.

The material we carved the sign from is called Precision Board or high density urethane. It is hard to explain what it actually is or what it feels like, and the best way to explain it would probably be to describe it as a super-dense insulating material. It is a great material to carve with, as it is extremely uniform and will never "surprise" you the way wood will sometimes when you are carving. It is a material that was specially made for the sign industry, and has been in use for over twenty years. This sign is actually carved out of one piece of material. After it is carved we use a primer call Sign Prime (imagine that!) that is specially made for this material that primarily helps the paint bond to it. This sign was already painted with Sign Prime, and tomorrow we will start hitting it with some green...

The Sign Prime that we use is a water-based primer (we only use oil based primers when we are working with wood) and we are going to follow up the water based primer with a water based paint. The paint that we put on the majority of our signs is a Latex Outdoor Acrylic Paint, and it is the best quality paint that we can possibly buy. I would say the majority of signs are painted with Oil-Based enamel paints, but Lincoln Sign Company has been using latex paints over 20 years with fantastic results. There are signs that have been out in the field for 5-7 years that we have done that still look as if they had just been painted. The color we are using here is what we call in-house "Dark Green" but is more specifically known in the shop as "Crylite-2-Pumps- Black". It is the color all of us see when we close our eyes. Yes, we do many, many, MANY green signs here at Lincoln Sign Company, but we do live up in the woods (Brown is a big color as well). If we were located in California I am sure our standard color would be Fuchsia or perhaps Teal.

Here is the sign right after Michelle put the first coat of paint on the border. For the border of the sign we use 1-Shot or (One-Shot) Paints. These are the paints that every sign-maker has in their paint cabinet, and they are what we use whenever we hand-letter a sign. The differ from the latex mainly because the have a smooth, glossy finish that levels out very well while drying, and they tend to be thicker so are easier to letter with. I think 1-Shot is the right call the paint the border of this sign, as it will give it a little bit of extra "zip" because it is a high-gloss paint. We will need to hit the border with 2 coats (as we do just about everything with at least two coats). The background green on the sign actually ended up getting about 4 or 5 until we were happy with it.

There is quite a bit going on in this picture. The trees have been painted a few different colors of green, and the "sky" background has been painted a purplish-blue. You might notice that the letters seem glossy? That is because Vicki has just painted "Gold Size" onto the letters. Gold size is a "glue" (not really, but we'll call it that) that will allow real 23K gold to "stick" to the carved letters. Oh, you might notice that there seems to be sand or powder all over the sign. This is so the gold will not stick to the background paint when we leaf it. I am guessing Vicki used baby powder for this sign, as she usually uses that, or a potato (the starch of the potato also can act as a "barrier" to keep gold from sticking)
 

Here is the Korber Sign, completed and hung in our "picture studio" for one last snapshot before it is picked up by its new owner. I was having a conversation with a friend the other day, and we were talking about websites and weblogs, and he asked me why I do the Lincoln Sign Company weblog the way I do (meaning "why do you put such an ungodly amount of time into it every day?") There are actually, many, many, many answers to this question, but the answer I gave him relates to this sign that we just completed. It is always a pleasure to make a sign for someone, and especially for something as personal as someones home. I want to "remember the process" of making this sign, and I want the ability to look back at this sign, years from now, and see the little details about the process that I may have forgotten. I also want that ability for any of the people who have, do, or will work with us at some point, to be able to take someone you care about to this little spot on the Internet and say "you see these trees? I painted those trees". That might sound like a small thing to some people, but it is my small thing... Now, if you want to see the entire process of making this sign, and other projects like it, you can go to where we tell the stories of how we make our signs...

Creating a Sandblasted Sign - September 2006

We create all kinds of signs here at the Lincoln Sign Company, and with some of these signs, we actually don’t even need our ShopBot to do them!  But here is the amazing thing, we still use it as a tool just like anything else in the shop, and the ShopBot seems to get used a little bit with everything we do, that’s how good it is.  Even with a job that had nothing to do with carving, we still use our ShopBot.  Amazing! We were contacted by Chip Roper of Roper Real Estate of Waterville Valley, NH back in  June about making a sign for his new location, and we installed that sign Thursday, August 24th, right on schedule.

The above picture shows the board that we are using for the project after it has been cut to size and it has been trimmed on the table saw.  How does one make a signblank?  Glad you asked.  Basically we take a number of boards, and glue them end-to-end to make a large piece of wood that will become our sign.

When we sandblast, our wood if choice is vertical-grain, Western Red Cedar.  We actually have it shipped in from Washington State, as I have not been able to find any nice Western Red Cedar (that I have been happy with) at this end of the country.  Why Western Red Cedar?  Resistant to insects, rot, and repels water to some degree.  It is also a very light wood (doesn't weigh all that much) and it likes being carved (as opposed to oak, which does not!). After the wood has been cut and trimmed, we use a tool call a "biscuit cutter" to cut slots in the boards.  When we glue the boards together, we will stick a wooden wedge called a "biscuit" into the slot which will help us get the boards lined up properly.

After spreading glue on the edges of the boards, we put the blank together and then pull it together using pipe-clamps.

Here is Chip's blank after all the clamps have been placed, and it will sit overnight and be ready to blast in the morning.

Now, here is where we used the ShopBot, and we used it for two things:

#1:  We actually use our ShopBot as a vertical planer.  After we take the clamps off a glue up, we lay it on the table, put a 0.5” bit into it, and then it pass over every square inch of the sign to plane off everything nice and flat.  Then we flip it over and do it again!  What we end up with is a picture perfect blank surface

#2:  Naturally, we also use the ShopBot to cut out the shape of the sign-blank.  It’s really a no-brainer to do that, and I can’t imagine picking up a jig-saw to do it.

As a matter of fact, I can’t tell you the last time we used the jig-saw in the shop.

Here are the glued up boards, after they have been sanded, planed, and cut to size and shape

Here is the sign after the "sandblast mask" has been applied.  What's sandblast mask?  Well, the way you make a sandblasted sign, is you take an air-compressor (a BIG one), hook it up to a special metal chamber called a "hopper" that is filled with a fine, abrasive material (we use coal-slag).  The hopper fills with pressurized air, and then you open the other end which is connected to a hose and a ceramic nozzle (like a fire-hose, kinda) That allows you to direct the coal-slag firing out the end of the hose.  Now, when you shoot this at wood, it wears the wood away.  The letters, border and mountain on this sign have  been covered with sandblast stencil (which is made out of rubber).  The rubber bounces the coal-slag away, preserving the wood underneath.  That is how you get the "raised lettering look, of a sandblasted sign".

Here is the sign in the sandblast shed ready for a good blastin!

Here is the Roper sign after it has been sandblasted When we pull the sandblast mask off, you can see that the letters and graphics have been untouched by the coal slag, and appear as if they have been "raised" above a rough-textured background.   Pretty slick...

Here you can see what is so unique about a sandblasted sign.  Sandblasted signs are very labor-intensive, but they are always worth the effort!  They can take a very straight-forward, clean logo, help it gain prestige and attention.

We really don't consider our job done until a sign is properly installed, and in some cases the install can be the most difficult part of making a sign.  Every installation has it own set of challenges, and this installation was more challenging than most.

Initially, when we went out to install this sign, we found that if we had not called Dig Safe (which is an organization that finds power, cable, and telephone lines in locations where you plan to dig - for free) I would be writing this "FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE."

Yes, the original location would have been going through what was probably the electrical trunk line for all of Waterville Valley, and needless to say it would have stung.... a bit.

So, we needed to go back to the shop, fabricate some different posts, and move the install up the hill.  When we were driving out to the location, I joked with Lee that we were digging in the middle of a huge rhododendron bush (which we were), and I could guarantee that we wouldn't encounter any rocks, but we would find lots of roots.  (When digging post holes, roots tend to be annoying but can be easily cut-away during the digging process, but rocks just plain slow you down and are very resistant to the whole "cutting" thing.)

Well, when we actually got to the site, we didn't find one root, but we found some really amazingly big, heavy, and annoyingly placed rocks.  We did, however, eventually get them all out, and everyone was all smiles after that.

Carving a Ski Sign - April 2006
	We recently did a ski sign for a family, and it was such an interesting and fun little project I wanted to write about it, even though we are thinking more about baseball than skiing at this time of year! This carved sign was a "thank you gift" from one family to another and I really wanted to create a sign that captured a "snowy" and "carefree" kind of feel. The image to the left is the proof that I sent to the customer.
	This is what the 3D model looks like in my modeling software ArtCAM Pro.
	OK, so this is what the sign actually looks like once we get into the process of carving it.  We use our ShopBot to do all of our carving, and each tool-path used to carve a feature of a sign is fed into the software item by item, and then is sent to the router, item-by-item. Now just because "a machine does it", does not mean that we sit back all day playing video games.  Creating a 3D model like the one for the skis takes about 2 hours (and that's not including the lettering toolpaths).
	Here is what the sign looks like after the lettering and in-line are carved.  We used a 90 degree V-Carving bit for this. Then it has been cut out creating the external shape. Now I need to do a bit of sanding, and it will be off to the paint-shop for this little guy.
	Here is the ski sign after it has been primed and painted. The Sign Prime that we use is a water-based primer (we only use oil based primers when we are working with wood) and we are going to follow up the water based primer with a water based paint. The paint that we put on the majority of our signs is a Latex Outdoor Acrylic Latex Paint, and is the best quality paint that we can possibly buy.  I would say the majority of signs (created in other sign shops) are painted with Oil-Based enamel paints, but Lincoln Sign Company has been using latex paints over 20 years with fantastic results.  There are signs that have been out in the field for 5-7 years that we have done that still look as if they had just been painted.  One of the things that we pride ourselves on as a company is creating signs that last a long, long time.
	In this picture our ski sign has been "lettered".  If you think that hand-painting carved letters and consistently staying within the lines takes a certain amount of skill,.... it does.  I'm not the one who does it, it is usually Vicki or Michelle at this point, and we have plans to get some other people trained to do it as well... I have done it in a pinch... For the lettering of our carved signs we use 1-Shot or (One-Shot) Paints.  These are the paints that every sign-maker has in their paint cabinet, and they are what we use whenever we hand-letter a sign.  The differ from the latex mainly because they have a smooth, glossy finish that levels out very well while drying, and they tend to be thicker so are easier to letter with. We will need to hit the letters with 2 coats (as we do just about everything with at least two coats).  The background blue on the sign actually ended up getting about 3 or 4 until we were happy with it.
Here is the ski sign completed and out of the shop.  Vicki painted the snow with a combination of blue and white, and was able to get a significant amount of detail in on the skis.  We really enjoy doing custom residential signs like this as it is wonderful to think that something we made will become an integral part of a legacy of someone's home.  This sign could be the first thing a person sees after getting home from work each day, the signal to someone that has a vacation home that they have arrived at their vacation destination, or just a wonderful little reminder to a ski enthusiast that even though it is August 15th and 98 degrees, one day soon there will be snow again. Those are the reasons that we make signs like these...

My First Report - March 2006

Back this past December of 2005, we were asked by South Peak Resort on Loon Mountain, to create some interesting and innovative Lot Signs for some properties that there were selling here in Lincoln, NH.  Traditionally, when we do Lot Signs, they are flat-painted wood or aluminum, as they are very temporary signs by nature, but South Peak Resort made it clear that they wanted something a little more distinctive to set these properties apart.

I am a big believer in carved signs, not only because they hold up well over time, always look distinguished (not to mention the fact that it is the primary type of sign we make here at Lincoln Sign Company).  Carved signs send a "message" to a businesses customer or prospective buyer.  A carved sign shows that the business is "solid", that the business takes its image very seriously, and that the business will stand the test of time.  I am always very pleased when a customer chooses any type of carved sign.

I initially spent some time prototyping these signs since there were going to be 67 of them. I spent about 3 and a half hours doing this "prototype" from start to finish.

Most of that time was spent in the 3D modeling software that we use (ArtCAM Pro) and planning how our ShopBot was going to cut everything efficiently and cleanly.  Also, I spent some time watching the router cut and tweaking the speeds that it will be cutting at to get the best balance between speed and clean finish cuts.

After the prototype you see in the photo above was done cutting, I was 88% happy with the result, and went back to the software to make the changes to get everything up to 100%.  I was also glad that I consulted Lee in my shop on what he thought about the end result, as he suggested a tweak that is going to make painting the borders on these much, much easier.

Now, normally we do not create a physical prototype for every sign we do, because:

#1:  The 3D carving software that we use actually allows us to create a "virtual prototype" on-screen so we can see what a sign will look like after it has been carved

#2:  That would get expensive (just the material for this prototype cost about $15.00 ), not to mention the time and effort involved.

The only time we are really justified in doing a prototype is when we are doing something radical we have never done before and we need to see if everything will "work out" like we think it will, or, we are going to be doing a lot of them and want to make sure that we have gotten everything correct.

	This is the control screen for ArtCAM Pro, which is the program that we use to control our ShopBot. It allows us to take simple line art, and tell our router to carve the line art with certain cutting tools to create shapes and angles.
	This picture shows the path that the cutting tool, in this case a 120 degree V-bit, will take as it cuts into the material to create that "20". As you see, it is even showing us a "simulation" on the screen of what the finished product will look like, which is extremely helpful as you can imagine.
	This view shows what will be the final tool-path that we will run, and this will be the one that cuts the sign out of the material.
	Our ShopBot is a terrific tool, and I really don't know how we could live without it, but the ShopBot is really only one small part of the equation that allows us to have fun every day creating memorable signs. The software we use, Gerber's OMEGA design software and ArtCAM Pro, play an important part, as well as all of the quality materials that we use to build our signs. But most importantly, it is the people here at Lincoln Sign Company that makes our mission possible. I am lucky enough to be surrounded by genuine craftspeople who care a great deal about what they do, and through caring, have become extremely talented.

We were able to cut 24 signs at a time using the router, and that is using 5 different sized and shaped cutting tools to get all of the angles and effects that we want. How long does it take? The total-elapsed cutting time is just about 4 hours, but figuring in tool changes etc the material is on the table for about 10 hours (some of the time it is just sitting there waiting for a tool-change as I am not going to run out immediately after it is done with the next cutting tool, it can just wait, thank you very much!)

Now, don't think all this technology makes our kind of sign-making effortless. Remember, I probably worked on the cutting files for about 12 hours to perfect them and get them set up for all the different lot signs. Still, it was nice to know that while I was out skiing at Loon Mountain my router was working on these...

Here is the first of these signs to make it through the entire production process. Originally we were going to go with one color of brown for both the letters and the border, but after getting into the actual painting process we opted to go with a dark brown for the border and a lighter, russet brown for the carved numbers. Worked much nicer with the overall coloration of the entire sign...

Once the production process started running full-bore, it was pretty much impossible to walk through the paint-shop without running into one of these signs. All the numbers and the border were hand-lettered, and the South Peak Resort logo was printing using our Gerber EDGE. These signs would have been impossible to do cost-effectively without out ShopBot, and that is probably one of the things I like most about having one here in the shop. We can pretty much offer a customer anything that they want, or that we can dream up, and then we just need to take a moment to figure out how to make the ShopBot do it.

Throughout the process of creating these signs, I kept track of our progress on our company's weblog. If you want to learn more about how we make signs at Lincoln Sign Company, feel free to visit [www.signsneversleep.com].