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H.D.U. FOAM SIGNAGE TIPS

High Density Urethane Foam has been a wonderful addition to the sign painters available substrates. With proper manufacturing techniques it is one of the most durable substrates around, improper manufacturing and installation techniques will leave you with an expensive piece of junk. The signs below were manufactured by unknown shops but are typical of most currently manufactured dimensional signs.

The sign on the left is manufactured from 1 1/2 inch thick H.D.U. and blasted on both sides. This results in very little lateral strength in the sign panel. H.D.U. is not strong enough to handle this application without adding strength to the sign panel. This sign was destroyed by a wind gust in the 20 to 30 m.p.h. range. The sad thing is this sign has been replaced with one made in exactly the same manner and is now cracked and looking poor again.

The sign on the right was from a local school. It was placed in an area where it was exposed to impacts from young children and was broken within a year of installation. We replaced it as a donation to the school with a more durable sign. Know your needs and what it takes to achieve them. These type signs are too expensive to just break within a year of the sale.

EXAMPLES OF POORLY MADE h.d.u. SIGNS

At Crowder Signs we employ a manufacturing technique we have not seen anywhere else in the South. If the sign is to be spanned between posts we laminate our H.D.U. panels with a center or bottom layer of Medium Density Overlay, according to if the sign is to be single faced or double faced. M.D.O. is a marine grade plywood product with a Kraft waterproof paper coating to insure smoothness. This results in a sign panel that is incredibly strong and durable. The structural strength added to the panel is significant. It requires maintaining a full woodworking shop to produce these panels which makes this process impossible for many modern sign shops. We exclusively use 3-M marine grade adhesives to insure a quality bond between materials.

OUR TECHNIQUE

The broken wildlife sign shown as an example above did not become another piece of waste buried in the local land fill. We actually recycled it into a usable panel for another project that was donated to a different charitable organization. These techniques allow us to help save the environment and be able to afford the preponderance of sign donations that we try to do for deserving organizations.

The sign was placed in the router and we used a surfacing bit to plane it down into a 1" flat blank. Next it was cut into the largest possible selection of rectangular pieces on the table saw. These pieces were then glued to M.D.O. backing sheets to create three usable blanks for future dimensional signs. Notice the few small jagged pieces of scrap behind the blade of the table saw in the last photo, not enough waste to even count. Can you tell I am a cheap old cuss?

RECYCLING H.D.U.