Hey there. I’d like to make a house sign for my neighbor. My thought was to do her name in black and some of the detail as v-carving. One thought I had was that I might inlay different woods to give the leaves different colors. I’m concerned that it will all bleach fairly rapidly even if I use a UV protective varnish. We are at high elevation, and the sun will hit the sign for a fair part of the day. Anyone have experience with this?
Outdoor signs can be challenging. The cool nights and warm days and the sun hitting the sign make it expand and contract. Since the sign is constantly expanding and contracting, natural products always do this, try using a synthetic material like solid PVC. You can buy trim at the big box stores or full sheets. There are two types of pvc. One is pvc veneer on the outside and foam on the inside. That does not work well for carving. The second is solid pvc. Recommend the solid pvc because as you carve it is solid pvc and not foam. You would need to use pvc glue but you can paint it with acrylic paint and put a top coat on it to protect it. Outdoor signs of any material eventually fails. Wood fails faster but even pvc will eventually detoriate. It might need paint refresh ever few years. The pvc can be used with traditional woodworking tools like saws and so on. One note of caution is pvc tends to make static. So make sure your machine is grounded or you will get disconnects. The same is true of other plastics like acryic.
Another option is color core plastics. They are made in layers of different colors so you carve down to the next layer for the contrasting color. Then no paint would need to be used.
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I recommend color core plastic from High Density Polyethylene for outside. Have some signs for some years, like new. Cut with “O”-flute.
Don’t know about wood inlays outdoor. Plastic inlays outdoor work fine
for 2 years now outdoor at a cafe, no signs of wear or tear.
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You inlayed that? Which portions?
the white layer was cut as the female inlay part, the orange was glued in then. Also the orange steam above the cup was made as an inlay, the yellow milk in the brown coffee was glued free hand.
orange.c2d (124 KB)
white.c2d (60 KB)
Yellow.c2d (100 KB)
The brown / white is two sided color core, the orange/yellow stock is colored acrylic, glued with cyanoacrylic.
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