Sign Idea

[Jman]

I have been thinking about an idea for a sign for a long time, but I am not sure where to start in making the idea become reality. What I want is some kind of metal box with the letters cut out on the front of the box. I then want to rig up some way to have fire inside the box. I am not sure is propane would work or if I would need some sort of cool burning flame. Or perhaps this idea is just not feasable.

[David]

Most Fire Codes won't allow an open flame like you propose. It has to be enclosed with venting.

I think that it would be a cool sign if you can get it to work.

We tried to get the OK to have natural gas fueled wall mounted torches for a club and the Fire Department axed the idea.

The fire effect can be achieved through lighting and cloth.

[Jman]

I've seen the cloth and light thing, and I think it is so lame. I know there is a type of fuel that burns cool, but I would imagine the cost would be prohibitive. Either that, or I could figure out a way to vent this sign.

[David]

I don't know of any fossil fuels that burn cool. And I do know a lot about fuel. The venting is for the CO and CO2 that fossil fuels release as they burn. You don't want to gas your patrons.

[jbrett]

Because of the type of Idea he, I think those cloth lights would work really well for this type of thing. I saw a couple of those fake flames and I actually thought they was real, so they are getting better and better.

With fake flames you have no hassles with fuel, smoke, heat.


Originally posted by Jman
I've seen the cloth and light thing, and I think it is so lame. I know there is a type of fuel that burns cool, but I would imagine the cost would be prohibitive. Either that, or I could figure out a way to vent this sign.

[Andrew]

A while ago I thought about the possibility of advertising by laser. The idea never really got off the ground but I have seen some great 3D advertising since then.

Of course, this is probably excessive but once in a while, it may work as an 'eyecatcher' if your visibility is high.

The new lasers use a beam-table (beam splitter?) to generate these neat 3D efects.

You could project the image into the "sky" or wherever. You could also use the laser in your club, too :)

[Jman]

There is a club in Ukraine called Cosmo that uses this concept. It's really quite simple, just a laser beam rotating in the sky, but it sure does increase the visibility. I would consider that here, but I imagine there are rules against such things due to it interfering with airplanes.

[Andrew]

I did not consider the planes, thanks for pointing that out. I suppose the other option is to bounce it off something nearby.
The beam splitter lasers seem to generate holograms; I think the rays bounce of eachother..again, I don't know what the "light leakage" is but it appears to be minimal from the shots I have seen.

[happybaboon]

Most airports will have very specific approach routes, so as long as your laser beam wasn't pointing into one of those you'd probably get away with it.

There was a club here that had two massive spotlights pointing into the sky for awhile earlier this year - no problems with aircraft at all. Eventually they canned them because they cost too much, and because the heat from them was making the underside of the roofing that it was on incredibly hot.