Food Living Outside Play Technology Workshop

Fake Neon Sign

by liquidhandwash on September 2, 2012

Table of Contents

Fake Neon Sign . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

Intro: Fake Neon Sign . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

Step 1: Stuff you will need . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

Step 2: Making the wooden base (glow in the dark sign) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

Step 3: Making the laser cut base (blinking sign) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

File Downloads . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Step 4: Wiring up the ribbons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Step 5: Engraving the sign . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

File Downloads . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

Step 6: Other stuff . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

Related Instructables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

http://www.instructables.com/id/Fake-Neon-Sign/
Intro: Fake Neon Sign
I didn't know what to call this instructable, "robot night light" "glow in the dark sign" "back lit laser engraving" "poor man's neon sign" all came to mind, but this could be
used for advertising, emergency exit sign, an award or it could just to sit on your desk and look pretty. The size is only limited to the size of the laser cutter you have. This
one runs of a battery, but you can run it from a plug pack, up to 12volts if it is going to be run all the time. As with most things that produce light it is very difficult to take a
photo that does it justice, even in the daylight it looks really good, and in a darken room it lights up a part of the room. I spent more time taking photos than actually
building it sadly this is the best I could do. It may be too bright for a kids night light. I made 2 versions of the sign the blinking "neon type" sign and the standard glow in
the dark sign.

Image Notes
1. This sign just glows in the dark

Image Notes
1. This sign blinks and has a second layer

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 Image Notes
1. yes it is sitting on the toilet, it was the darkest room and the photo is still crap

Step 1: Stuff you will need

To make a basic glow in the dark sign you will need.

access to a laser cutter

LED ribbon
9 volt battery or 12 volt regulated plug pack
battery snap
block of wood to mount the base.
3mm cast acrylic sheet, clear or the florescent colours for the sign
tools, sand paper, timber finish, soldering iron, drill, saw etc

The blinking fake neon sign will also need

A flip flop circuit

fine hook up wire
A CAD drawing program that can import and export DXF files is also useful
acrylic glue
3mm cast acrylic sheet solid colour for the base

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 Image Notes
1. Any pretty block of wood will do for the base

Image Notes
1. Ribbon comes in a big roll

Step 2: Making the wooden base (glow in the dark sign)

I cut a nice piece of timber 120mm long, and cut a slot in the bottom 1 inch (about 25- 26mm) wide and and about 17mm deep, you may wonder why I sometimes use
mm and inches in my projects its because I live in a metric country but quite often I use parts that have been made using inches, like the 9 volt battery which exactly one
inch wide, which is much easier to read on a ruler than 25.4 mm.
The slot was cut on a bench saw and the waste cut out with a chisel. A 9mm slot 10mm deep was cut on the top side as the ribbon is 9mm wide. 2 pieces of 3mm thick
acrylic were cut as spaces to locate and support the sign, and these are fitted on top of the ribbon.
After test fitting everything and soldering the battery snap on the 2 smaller blocks can be glued in. The base was sanded up and given a coat of furniture oil.

http://www.instructables.com/id/Fake-Neon-Sign/
 Image Notes Image Notes
1. cut slots with a saw bench 1. battery can fit under the bottom

Image Notes
1. block can be cut and glued into the ends

Image Notes Image Notes

1. test fit LED ribbon 1. push in 2 strips of 3 mm cast acrylic either side of the surface mounted
LEDs

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 Image Notes
1. First test run, to much detail at bottom interferes with the light flow making the
top dark

Image Notes Image Notes

1. The LEDS without the sign in place 1. I drilled part of one of the blocks to allow the wiring to pass through.

Image Notes
1. Ribbon with the backing removed

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 Image Notes Image Notes
1. ribbon in correct postion 1. 2 strips off acrylic pushed in beside the LEDs

Image Notes Image Notes

1. space for wires 1. sanded and ready for a coat of oil

Image Notes
1. finished base

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Step 3: Making the laser cut base (blinking sign)
The base for the blinking sign was designed on Prodesktop and cut out with the laser cutter. the only really important measurements are the gap to fit the 2 ribbons, the 2
signs and the 3 spaces. The dxf file is below, if you want to cut out a base that is the same, you must use 3 mm material.
Once the base is glued together the ribbons can have wires soldered to them, the adhesive backing removed and placed in the base.There is some overlap in the middle,
as the ribbons are 9 mm wide and the space is only 15mm.

Image Notes
1. needs a little glue to hold everything togther

Image Notes
1. the 3 spaces are at the bottom

Image Notes
1. fresh out of the laser cutter

Image Notes Image Notes

1. test fitting 1. four wires are needed

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 Image Notes
1. ribbons soldered on

Image Notes Image Notes

1. One ribbon is pushed up against the side 1. The other ribbon pushed up against the other side the is some over lap in
the middle

File Downloads

laser cut dxf.dxf (34 KB)

[NOTE: When saving, if you see .tmp as the file ext, rename it to 'laser cut dxf.dxf']
Step 4: Wiring up the ribbons
To wire up the glow in the dark sign, its just a case of soldering a battery snap to the ribbon. The ribbon that I bought has a weather proof coating, which has to be
removed so that the LEDs touch the acrylic sheet, so you can get to the pads that need to be soldered. A quick look on google and I found that not all ribbons have this
coating. The pads have to be scratched with a knife to remove the coating or the solder will not stick. LEDs are polarity sensitive and can be damaged if wire the wrong
way around. So make sure the red wire goes to the + sign on the ribbon. I found they work fine on a 9 volt battery, but 12 volts will make the sign even brighter.
The blinking sign has a flip flop circuit driving the 2 ribbons. Flip flops are a pretty common circuit and there is lots of info on the net about them, you can buy them as a kit
or make your own with a few cents worth of parts. there is even an instructable on how to build one here. http://www.instructables.com/id/Flip-flop-LED-circuit/
Just wire in the ribbons where the 2 LEDs would normally go. The kit that I got has pots which allow you to adjust the blink rate.
A word of warning about plug packs there are 2 types, regulated and unregulated. Just because an unregulated plug pack says its output is 12 volts, doesn't mean you
will get 12 volts out of it, unless it is connected to the correct load the output could be double that, frying your flip-flop, and LEDs. Go for a regulated plug pack, its output
voltage will be more stable regardless of the load.

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 Image Notes
1. remove the coating if you ribbon has it
2. these pads have to be clean and shiny before your attempt to solder them

Image Notes Image Notes

1. flip flop kit just remove the leds and wire in the ribbons 1. a 9 volt unregulated plug pack with an output voltage of 14 volts, (no load)

Step 5: Engraving the sign

The Laser cutter I have access to is a cheap Chinese rabbit laser, and has its limitations, one of them being you can't cut and engrave on the same drawing, so it is quite
difficult to get the engraving in the centre of the cut. I found that most images can be imported straight into the laser cutters software and it would do a reasonable job, but
to much detail at the bottom of the sign will interfere with the light causing dark spots above it. So I remove the Instuctables text from below the robot and this gave a
much better result.
This was removed with Gimp, which is a free, photo editing software Linux, Macs and Windows.
Engraving takes a long time with a laser cutter as the gantry whizzes back and forth across the material not unlike a printer, so the robot took around 1/2 an hour to
engrave.
With the text I drew it in pro desktop, and exported it as a dxf file which will be recognized as something to cut by the laser, I then turned the cut speed up, and the power
level down, so that the text would only be cut part way through the plastic. This means that the text can be engraved in around 30 seconds.
Some interesting effects can be made by playing with the focus of the laser as well as the power levels, Moving the material closer to the lasers lens gave a ghosting
effect, while further away gave a wide line effect.
I also found that the engraving is slightly better when viewed from the back side, so I mirrored the text and the robot.

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 Image Notes Image Notes
1. I had to remove this part as it interfered with the light flow to the robot 1. This is the image I use on the laser cutter

Image Notes
1. Gimp can also remove the colour but I found it work better in colour on the
laser

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 Image Notes Image Notes
1. engraving in progress 1. 1/2 way

Image Notes Image Notes

1. hard to photograph but the letters on the bottom are wide and a little fuzzy 1. letters look ghostly.
2. camera observes every little speck of dirt scratches and finger marks that you
cant really see with the naked eye

File Downloads

sign blank.dxf (17 KB)

[NOTE: When saving, if you see .tmp as the file ext, rename it to 'sign blank.dxf']

sign share make.dxf (425 KB)

[NOTE: When saving, if you see .tmp as the file ext, rename it to 'sign share make.dxf']
Step 6: Other stuff
If you just wanted to make a sign without the glowing part, I found that painting the engraving with spray paint and wiping off the excess with a paper towel, soaked in
meths worked very well. I made a spelling bee award this way and it worked very well, ( I stupidly didn't take a photo of it)
I am also planing to make a blinking sign with coloured LEDs an clear acrylic, which I think could possibly work better than the coloured plastic, and white LEDs
Come to think of it there is no reason I could have 3, 4 or even more layers to the sign and run it off a micro controller, and have some real animation happening.

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 Image Notes Image Notes
1. All you need paint, paper towel, meths and a flat surface 1. spray paint

Image Notes Image Notes

1. rub over the paper towel soaked in meths while the paints wet 1. robot appears from the paint

Image Notes Image Notes

1. not to bad 1. maybe another little rub

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 Image Notes
1. coloured LED ribbons
Image Notes
1. one robot

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