Water resistant mdf for sign?

[tree]

I am not in the business of sign making but we need a new sign for our business. I have the design and its just under 96x48 and will be hung on the side of the building under an eve onto a brick wall. Will water resistant MDF primed and painted stand up to this application? I am in North Carolina just west of Charlotte if that says anything about the weather. I am also open to other material suggestions hoping that one of our sheet good suppliers carries it.

Brian

[jhicks]

MEDEX factiory recommendations say prime with epoxy or polyurethane and round all sharp corners.
follow recommendations and you should be happy.
PVC would be another alternative but it can warp so over drill mounting holes for expansion.
Are you carving it or just painting it?
Always helpful to check with the manufacturer on specs for finishing.
More is out there like HDU,di bond, and color core so depends on what you want to achieve.

[andyb]

Check out Extira. www.extira.com (http://www.extira.com) Like you I'm not in the sign business but I did cut two for a friend who owns a medical office. Extira was $65 for a 4'x8'x3/4" sheet. I had someone create the cut file for me with a woodgrain background so all I had to do was cut it. When you paint it you'll need to put on a couple coat of polyuthrene. I just cut it and my friend had his painter paint it. The sign turned out great.

Andy B.


6241

[br928]

Brian, I am not in the sign business either but, like you, I needed a sign for my business. It was going to be installed in a similar protected location as yours. I went out and bought a sheet of signfoam for about $400. After my design was complete I thought it wise to test cut it in some regular MDF before the expensive signfoam. I liked the result so much that I painted it with some good quality latex paint and installed it. It has been up for almost a year now and still looks great. Now I still have to find a project for that sheet of signfoam!

P.S. I did seal the MDF with a 50/50 mixture of yellow glue and water before painting.

[ckurak]

Andy,

Great looking sign. What software was used to create the cut file with the woodgrain background?

Thanks,

Charles

[harryball]

Small world... I've seen that sign even if I don't know it :-)

[andyb]

Charles,
Ed Conley host of the Atlanta Shopbot Camp created the cut file for me using ArtCAM. He charged a modest fee that my friend paid for. I gave Ed the basic layout and he sent me the cut files. The best thing was all I had to do was throw the extira on the bot and start cutting. There was some smaller signs with the address and suite numbers with the woodgrain also.

Robert,
If you've been up to exit 16 off I-985 you've been in my neck of the woods. We breifly met at the Atlanta camp. I was the big ugly guy that cut the 3D eagle.

Andy B.

[bridgetca]

My husband and I own a small signmaking business. You can see some of our work on our website at www.wecarve.com (http://www.wecarve.com). We've used many materials over the years, but now we use Extira exclusively. All you have to do is wash it well with water and a bit of dishwashing liquid. Rub hard to remove all the dust and surface oil. When dry, we roll it with latex enamel from Sherwin Williams - no primers! Sand lightly between coats. Wait 24 hours before masking,and you won't have paint peeling up with the mask.

This doesn't have much to do with the topic, but I read so many posts where people were having trouble with the paint not sticking to Extira. Primers were blamed but we found they had nothing to do with it. It's the dust and oily spots from production.

[fleinbach]

Bridget,

Great sign work and welcome to the forum.

[joe]

Briget,

Welcome to the forum. It's good to see other quality sign artists posting.

Like you, we are firmly in the Extira camp. I'll have to give your soap and water technique a try.
We realy like this product for making our fluted sign posts. I thought we were the only ones doing this.

J.
www.normansignco.com (http://www.normansignco.com)

[bridgetca]

Thanks for the welcome. Joe, your signs are beautiful, and you have a nice website, too.

We've only made extira posts a few times, but they really look nice. Hope the soapy water technique helps all the frustrated Extira users.