WELCOME!

It is hard to believe that it was almost ten years ago I witnessed a CNC router in action for the very first time. I was fascinated and simply had to have one! Although I had been in the creative end of the three dimensional sign business for most of my life I didn't really know what I would do with one of these machines - but I just knew it could do fantastic stuff.

Along with the CNC router I discovered the wonderful material called Precision Board and the glues, primers and other companion products they offer. Since then we have gone through many tons of the material using it in most signs and projects we tackle. This journal will chronicle our many adventures both past, present and future. I'll talk from the perspective of someone who pushes these products to the creative limit on a daily basis. I'll be adding to the stories two or three times each week. -dan

Monday, June 19, 2017

Packing for the trip

We think carefully about how we will move our pieces in the shop as we build them. They need to be safely lifted into the transport truck and secure while they are being transported. Once on site our customer needs to easily and safely move them once more, lift them into place and secure them in place permanently. It is easy to say but requires lots of thought and engineering to pull off. 

The planning starts as we design the pieces with lifting and mounting points built in from the start. The combined weight of the pieces for this shipment is about fifteen thousand pounds.

Tomorrow the trucking company will drop off a fifty-three foot long trailer for us to load. It will leave on Thursday morning. Today we shifted our efforts from production to packing. The pub signs we finished late last year were cut off their temporary stands and welded onto a new custom designed steel pallet. Underneath the signs four post backs will rest. These heavy pieces will provide ballast weight to keep the top heavy signs in place.

The pieces are fabricated from a variety of materials including, steel, plywood, concrete, sculpting epoxy and 30 lb Precision Board. Each piece has hard points built into the piece for lifting, carrying during transport and final mounting.

The pallet holds the six pub signs as well as four post backs which go on sideways, in pairs on each end of the pallet.


The massive (and heavy) posts sit on a structure that mimics the six by six steel posts they will surround when they are mounted. In the background two arches are mounted back to back and at a slight angle for safe moving and transport. Ten of these arches will fit on this load.