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I need advice on how to get these signs ready for pickup by the customer. I not really sure what kind of vehicle they will show up with...we recommended a large flatbed. Anyway, I want to have these things secured without getting the surfaced marred. The signs are 8' wide and 12' tall. They have a welded 1" square tube aluminum frame with dibond face glued on with Lords adhesive.
I don't have much expereience with this so any help would be much appreciated!
[ October 23, 2006, 05:18 PM: Message edited by: Dave Correll ]
-------------------- Dave Correll Posts: 283 | From: Faribault, MN | Registered: Jan 1999
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My thought, if they are going to be stacked on a flatbed would be to use the cheapest rubber carpet underlay that you can find and place it between each sign. Cover with a couple of sheets of plywood and ratchet down.
-------------------- Dave Grundy retired in Chelem,Yucatan,Mexico/Hensall,Ontario,Canada 1-519-262-3651 Canada 011-52-1-999-102-2923 Mexico cell 1-226-785-8957 Canada/Mexico home
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Dave, you don't want anything that will bond or imprint the surfaces. We save all of the carrier paper we use so we can use it for packing just such things. Put the carrier paper glossy side down on the painted/film (whatever) faces, 1/2" thick styrofoam, cheap masonite shipping sheets both sides of each layer and definiteley band it all. Most all of our larger pieces are shipped out of the valley or out of state. We do palletize when we can, and there are 8'x12' pallates available to us, so I'd guess they must be in your area too? Some of our very large pieces we crate with spacers.
P
-------------------- Pierre St.Marie Stmariegraphics Kalispell,Mt www.stmariegraphics.com ------------------ Plan on knowing everything before I die and time's running out! Posts: 4223 | From: Kalispell,Mt 59903 | Registered: Mar 2000
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Dave, whatever you do, DON'T put coroplast between the signs. It causes a weird reaction with one-shot, almost making it orange peel where they touch if placed together. Pierre has a great suggestion about carrier paper. Gorgeous signs, by the way. I would expect nothing less from you. Love....Jill
Posts: 8834 | From: Butler, PA, USA | Registered: Jan 2001
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what about wrapping each feather with some foam wrap you can get from a shipping company. Then possibly rubber or even scrap carpet from your local flooring or hardware store to lay between. Coroplast can be put between the carpet or rubber...although rubber may have a reaction to paint as well. If the paint is fresh...I would use carpet or some kind of cotten material so the paint can escape air.
-------------------- Ottawa Custom Signs Stittsville, Ontario Posts: 346 | From: Stittsville, ON | Registered: Dec 1998
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When we ship we wrap the signs completely with the clear wrap stuff. This time I went to Sam's and bought a huge roll of plastic food wrap as it's much cheaper.
We then put styrofoam between signs and on the tops, bottoms and sides of crates for shipping. Never had a problem yet with many shipped all over the country and even the Caribbean.
With your feathers you may need to use another method though. Or different levels of stryrofoam maybe in those areas?????
[ October 23, 2006, 06:53 PM: Message edited by: Amy Brown ]
-------------------- Amy Brown Life Skills 101 Private Address Posts: 3502 | From: Lake Helen, FL, USA | Registered: Feb 2001
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You might be able to build a custom crate and bolt to the mountings for the signs in such a way that they can be secured inside the crate with an inch or two of air space between the signs. That way, nothing touches the faces.
I think that may be what Pierre suggested in crating with spacers. We have often used our carrier paper just as Pierre said.
By the way, beautiful work!
-------------------- David Harding A Sign of Excellence Carrollton, TX Posts: 5089 | From: Carrollton, TX, USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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Hi Dave...Nice work...We use egg cartons ( the foam kind snapped shut)as spacers and vinyl carrier paper as discribed above, then crated. But this may not be practical as you will need a lot of cartons. Bigger jobs like this we have done, crated each sign individually and then hired a truck to haul them at the clients expence. Good Luck with it. Pat
-------------------- Pat Welter Masterhand Signs and Designs Unity, Saskatchewan.Canada Posts: 1304 | From: Unity, Saskatchewan.Canada | Registered: May 1999
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with signs that have fragile pieces such as pictured here, i have had good results by keeping the "drop" from the substrate that the sign was cut from (especially with jobs cut on a cnc router) then place the drop in place and package up the sign as if it was not a irregular shape. it protects the small pieces from side to side movement and makes it so that there is no strain on peices from strapping, wrap, etc.
Posts: 445 | From: Slidell, LA | Registered: Feb 2004
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Thanks for your response, suggestions and compliments. I now have a pretty good idea on how to prepare these signs for transport. The key things I'm concerned with is the faces not getting marred or scratched, but packaging them as economically as possible.
To answer some of the questions...perhaps some additional pictures will help. The signs have a 1" square aluminum tube frame faced with dibond. The local fabricator I hired did an awesome job with the frames...they were perfect. The feathers are not as fragile as they look, they are dibond with 3/4" hdu epoxied to the back side with a 1" space down the center of the feather to accept the 1" square tube frame.
As far as how they wil be installed...here's the concept drawing showing that they will be attached to the aluminum window frames. I gracefully declined to offer to install these babies. I'll let someone smarter than me to figure how to put these things up!
-------------------- Dave Correll Posts: 283 | From: Faribault, MN | Registered: Jan 1999
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I did a quick layout of a couple of ways you might be able to crate this. I only showed the braces across the bottom. You will have to figure the rest of the crating yourself. This lends itself to stacking at least two pieces in a crate.
One thing to keep in mind. My process shows attaching through holes in the square tube frame. Unless weep holes are at the bottom of the tubing, the holes will need to be sealed in some way (they can even be taped over). Even in Texas, I've seen square tubing blown out from water getting inside and freezing in the wintertime.
-------------------- David Harding A Sign of Excellence Carrollton, TX Posts: 5089 | From: Carrollton, TX, USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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Dave, I have nothing to add about shipping, but I have a question about your fabrication. I also use Dibond/alum tubing/lords for my dimensional work; however, recently I had a small panel blade sign just fall right off the tube frame seven months after install. I had used a Sem "self etching primer" on the aluminum tubing, applied Lords 406/19 acrylic adhesive, then clamped on the clean/scuffed dibond. I've done alot of this before with no failures. So my question is......How do you join these two materials ?....do you clean/scuff/prime tubing and then apply adhesive ? and what Lord's are you using. Thanks for any infomation on your process. Your work looks great !
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David, thanks for taking the time for the drawing, that's an excellent option.
Vance, I used lords 406/19 as well. I talked to a fellow letterhead who uses lords adhesive with great results and what they recommended was to first sand the aluminum and dibond with 120 or 150 grit sand paper with an random orbital sander, then wipe down with lacquer thinner, then wipe with a 50/50 mix of water and isopropyl alcohol. Get the surfaces really clean. One key tip is when after you bond the two pieces together....don't pull apart to reposition. If you need to reposition. just slide the piece or pieces into position, then clamp.
-------------------- Dave Correll Posts: 283 | From: Faribault, MN | Registered: Jan 1999
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....so it seems having "clean" material is the main step.. paramount to good adhesion........Do you just clean the tubing and leave unprimed, clean the dibond as is(factory coated paint), apply the Lord....(hahaaaa...that's funny), and you've got good adhesion !...this is a question Dave...thanks
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...scored and clean surface is the main step...paramount to good adhesion. The tubing unprimed, dibond as is (after sanding and cleaning). I did a test sample with this process and same materials and pretty much destroyed the sample piece before I got the joint to start failing, so I feel confident in the adhesion. I would recommend doing a sample test yourself.
Hope this helps. You do some fine work yourself!
-------------------- Dave Correll Posts: 283 | From: Faribault, MN | Registered: Jan 1999
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Hiya Dave, How far are they going, Across town or across the state? I really cant tell from the pics you posted, are all of the elements on the same plane? If it's just across town, I would use Pierre's suggestion and use the paper carrier (and whatever else is necessary to shim and prevent damage) between the signs and stack them on the vehicle face to face and back to back. Tape them together and strap them down to the vehicle to prevent shifting during transit. If they're going further, there are no short cuts. Building a proper crate that can be handled with a forlift would be the only way to go.
Havin' fun,
Checkers
-------------------- a.k.a. Brian Born www.CheckersCustom.com Harrisburg, Pa Work Smart, Play Hard Posts: 3775 | From: Harrisburg, Pa. U.S.A. | Registered: Nov 1998
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