Sign and Laminated Plastic questions

[Leo Voisine]

I am learning lots every day - but still lots I don't know.

1) Not Sure where to post questions like this so I linked to two places.

A) Lamintaed Plastic for engraving.
- How do you cut sheet laminated 1/16 thick plastic. After cutting I am going to engrave the pieces on my CNC Router. Pieces are from business card size and up. I cut some on the table saw - but the plastic is very thin and flexible. There must be a better way.

B) Sign Construction
- To make a sign out of wood - say 24"x24". How would you construct that sign? Would you glue seperate boards together? Would you use gorilla glue? Would you use Titebond III? What kind of wood would you use? White Oak? MDF? ???

C) Exterior sign
- Fully painted outside sign construction would be ---->???
Plywood????

D) Interior sign
- NOT painted inside sign construstion would be ----> ???



How's that - I got 10 questions in here?


Edit in ---
I don't have a laser machine
I do have a full woodworking shop - table saw, OLD bandsaw, planer jointer,etc. I do have a nice router table.
My Router is Larken 24x24.
The sheet plastic is Romark.

?? Added question - what is a pin type bit? Can I use that in my router table?



Leo

[Nancy Laird]

I am learning lots every day - but still lots I don't know.

1) Not Sure where to post questions like this so I linked to two places.

A) Lamintaed Plastic for engraving.
- How do you cut sheet laminated 1/16 thick plastic. After cutting I am going to engrave the pieces on my CNC Router. Pieces are from business card size and up. I cut some on the table saw - but the plastic is very thin and flexible. There must be a better way. Leo, what other equipment do you have? If you have a laser, you may be able to cut this material on the laser--you could also raster the business cards and cut them in the same file. I'm sure another laser-er will chime in on this question. Lots depends on what plastic it is. Is is Rowmark? That will cut on the laser. Depending on the size of your CNC router table, you may be able to cut it with the router also, using a pin-type bit.

B) Sign Construction
- To make a sign out of wood - say 24"x24". How would you construct that sign? Would you glue seperate boards together? Would you use gorilla glue? Would you use Titebond III? What kind of wood would you use? White Oak? MDF? ??? Unless you are lucky enough to find a board of white oak, cedar, or redwood that is 24" wide, you're gonna have to glue up a panel. Use Gorilla Glue (wear gloves - DAMHIKT!!) or equivalent if you will be putting it outside; if inside, regular yellow wood glue will be fine.

C) Exterior sign
- Fully painted outside sign construction would be ---->???
Plywood???? NO!! Use white oak, cedar, or redwood. If it's going to be painted, but outside, the weather conditions will affect the paint, so you're going to have to use something like a spar varnish or similar to keep from having to redo the sign once a year.

D) Interior sign
- NOT painted inside sign construstion would be ----> ??? Maple, birch, white oak, cedar, redwood, oak. It's going to depend on the sign, how you want it to look, if it will be routed or lasered, or have letters or words attached.

How's that - I got 10 questions in here?

Leo

I think we need more information from you to fully answer your questions.

Nancy

[Leo Voisine]

Nancy - I undated my original question with some edit in stuff.

Thanks for the great information

[Nancy Laird]

Edit in ---
I don't have a laser machine
I do have a full woodworking shop - table saw, OLD bandsaw, planer jointer,etc. I do have a nice router table.
My Router is Larken 24x24.
The sheet plastic is Romark.

?? Added question - what is a pin type bit? Can I use that in my router table?
Leo

Leo, too bad you don't have a laser--you could use it to produce your business cards/name tags/etc. on the Rowmark in one sitting.

A pin-type bit is a router straight bit that has a very small tip for doing fine detail work -- most often used in a CNC router -- the smallest I see available in my WWS catalog is 1/4", but I believe that you might check with your CNC supplier and they may have smaller ones. I saw a machine at the AWFS that had a bit in it that couldn't have been more than 1/8", and perhaps smaller.

[David Lavaneri]

Leo,

You can cut flexible engraving stock on your table saw, but you'll need carbide tipped blades.

The easier way to deal with cutting relatively small plate sizes is with a tabletop shear. They cost about $300 (less if used) and are capable of cutting sizes up to 12" by any length.

With a change of the top blade, you can be cutting thin (.025) metal sheet stock.

Of course, you'll only be able to cut plates with straight lines and not shaped plates.

David "The Stunt Engraver" Lavaneri

[Larry Bratton]

Leo;
Try this material. http://www.extira.com I use a good bit of this to fabricate exterior signs. If you will check my profile, you will find a link to my website. Their are examples there of signs made with it. It routes and works like MDF but it is totally exterior. I have signs out there that have been in place for years now with no effects from the weather.
Good luck with your sign business.

[Joe Pelonio]

I agree that you can cut flexible engraving stock on your table saw, and in a pinch scoring with a utility knife on the back side and snapping works.

Also a router will cut it.

As for wood sign panels, unless you want natural wood background or are sandblasting (cedar or redwood glued up) always use MDO. Anything else will crack in weather. I buy 1/2" 4x8 sheets pre-primed for about $25 and just topcoat the face and leave the back in primer and they last 10+ years outdoors with vinyl lettering. the weak area is edges, I fill any voids and paint two coats on the edges with a 3" roller before I roll or spray the face.

Look sometime at those temporary highway construction signs. They are often MDO with reflective vinyl and lettering on the front, but nothing on the back and they hold up outdoors.

For inside, any wood should work as long as it's dry so stays flat.

[Brian Robison]

Larry, interesting material. Have you lasered it?
How'd it work?
Thanks

[Scott Shepherd]

Brian, it lasers very nice, but you have to cut it first, as it's 1/2" thick. I used it on two recent vinyl signs, as I couldn't locate double sided MDO anywhere around here and didn't want to order it. It was actually cheaper than MDO, single sided.

It routes very well also.

[Brian Robison]

Sample should be on it's way.

[Leo Voisine]

Thank you all

I guess I am just going to do the cutting on the table saw. It's not all that bad.

Maybe I will also do some of the edge trimming on the router.

For now cutting on the table saw is doable.