How to Make a Custom LED Sign

Description:

This week I wanted to take a shot at making an LED sign using wood and a piece of acrylic. I started off by\creating a design for my sign. The best thing you can use for this is a combination of google images and Adobe Illustrator. I found a Lions Logo that I thought looked pretty cool and with the help of Adobe Illustrator, I was able to edit and send the design off to my CNC machine. I had my CNC carve out the design into a piece of acrylic and while it was carving, I got to work on the wooden frame. For this I used pine 1×2’s and a little bit of 1/4″ plywood. I began with the face of the frame. I cut out miters on my table saw and glued up the pieces to resemble a picture frame. While the glue was curing, I built the back box for the frame to mount to. I used butt joints for this part (since you won’t see them). This part was also made out of pine 1×2’s and was about a 1/2″ smaller than the wood frame. I glued up and nailed the box together and cut a rabbet into the backside for my 1/4″ plywood to go. From here, I glued the box to the mitered frame, and sanded everything to a nice smooth finish. I spray painted the frame black and added my piece of Acrylic. I installed LED’s to the inside of the back box and chose blue to light up my sign. This turned out to be a pretty cool little sign and it was really just a concept I wanted to tryout before I make a big version of it.