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tgriffith94

backlit sign help

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I'm doin my first backlit sign. the customer's wanting to stick to a pretty tight budget so he asked if we could just use flourescent lights from home depot or lowes or smthn. it's a 3 foot by 16 foot sign. my question is, would 4 8ft flourescent lights be enough to aluminate it. im using 1/8in white acrylic for the sign. any advice or ideas would be greatly appreciated. thanks, taylor

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I have used flourescents from Lowes in the past. The only thing I did do is made sure I bought a good ballast set up with them do to the local climates here I in the winter getting so cold I was always concerned about moisture building up. I never had a problem with illuminating the sign from the inside with them I would recommend going with maybe smaller ones just for ease of changing the bulbs when they do burn out but that is just my opinion.

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The regular fluorescent tubes won't work in cold weather. You need Ho or high output tubes and ballast to work right . Most all your sign supply companies carry them and the sockets. If it is a refurbished with existing wiring you may just need tubes and or a new ballast . Going cheap will produce poor results.

Dan

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If your just re-facing and re-lamping a sign can that's one thing. If the cabinet is shallow less the 6" you'll need pan faces else you'll have light burn real bad. I'd use a pan split face regardless as threading 16 foot of acrylic is no fun at all. If if must be one piece use polycarbonate it more impact resistant. As for lamps if I was to build a 3'x16' sign can it have 6 F96T12-HO lamps with a 2448-46 BL ballast. But if your not competent with electrical sign construction... do not put others and property at risk by hacking something together with shop lights.

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