Ken Naasz is design and development VP at The Sign Factory (Kirkland, WA).
The Sign Factory (TSF) was awarded the bid for five, solar-powered monument signs at Eastern Washington University (EWU). The jobs included working at a remote site approximately 300 miles from Seattle with weather extremes – a challenge for solar-powered signage. Also, such projects require sophisticated energy consumption and storage components to operate in darkness. And, among other things, the job required extensive excavation and precast-concrete forming and installation.
The beginning
Founded in 1882 as Eastern Washington State College, EWU offers the state’s best public-education value. It’s now Washington’s fastest-growing public institution, with more than 10,000 students, and EWU’s College of Business and Public Administration ranked in the 2011 edition of The Princeton Review’s annual guidebook, The Best 300 Business Schools. The 300-acre, park-like campus is just 17 miles from Washington’s second largest city, Spokane.
The university’s Board of Trustees included the completion and implementation of the Campus Sustainability Master Plan in its goals for the 2010-2011 academic year. The plan specified five, solar-powered, monument signs. Jacobs Engineering’s Environmental Graphic Design Group (EGDG) worked with the facility’s management team on the pioneering green project. George Lim, EGDG’s national creative director, said an LED-lit sign program would consume no power and require less maintenance than traditional signs running on a power grid.
The completed signs were expected to be “carbon neutral” – 100% solar powered and avoiding typical energy consumption. Using Jacobs’ concept designs, TSF engineered, fabricated and installed the sign system. TSF President Jim Risher said experience keyed successful project execution.
Energy savings
The five signs varied in size from 4 x 8 ft. to 22 x 8 ft. TSF value-added the concept design by adding reverse-channel, LED halo lighting to increase the signs’ impact and readability. Equally important, all of the LED lights are powered by 12VDC. The two sign types that comprise granite towers (erected in tandem with cast, concrete monuments) require just a 3A current, and the complementary, horizontal monument signs draw only 2A of current. All told, the signs required approximately 400 linear ft. of LEDs.
This unique, proprietary design eliminated the need for conversion to alternating current to gather and store DC voltage from the sun. For accenting lighting in the concrete-tower monument signs, which were identified in the project as “G1” and “G2,” lamps were recessed into the integral concrete structure. For the other monument signs, referenced as “ID1”, “ID2” and “ID3”, we ground-mounted lamps for uplighting.
We designed the signfaces using Delcam’s Artcam 2009 Express and Gerber Scientific Products’ Composer 3.6 software, and fed the design into AXYZ Toolpath for Windows, our AXYZ 5010 6 x 10-ft., CNC flatbed router’s onboard program. We routed the aluminum background panels and created second-surface channel letters with stainless-steel returns internally lit with white LEDs. We welded the signface’s metal components together with a Millermatic 175 220V, wire-feed welder.
Rock stars
TSF replaced the columns’ original, cultured-stone design with tons of granite to honor the history and granite-stone architecture of the Normal School, an original campus building that had burned down. The site’s original, granite stones now serve as a monument to the Pillars of Hercules in front of Showalter Hall, at the campus’ traditional entryway.
The TSF team partnered with precast companies and masons to construct the huge signs, steps and footings onsite. We secured all the signs above 3 ft. 6 in. deep, concrete pier footings. They needed a solution to provide the signs with solar power during periods of darkness. The solution required a system that used photovoltaic, solar-array panels to gather and store energy.
The company also contracted with solar design and engineering firms to develop the storage mechanism and configure each unique sign location to overcome the obstacles, such as array-panel placement. One sign site required placing the array panel 150 ft. away from the sign, atop an 18-ft. pole. We did this for aesthetic reasons; we didn’t want the solar array to interfere with the sign’s sightlines.
Because the panel was inaccessible to vehicles, the TSF team attached a three-pane panel the size of a sail to the crane. It was very windy on installation day, and we had to wait for the gusts of wind to subside in order to prevent the rope-tethered solar arrays from sailing away like kites.
A photo-electric charger, made by Outback Power Technologies, serves as the signs’ nerve center. Mark Robison, president of Rain City Solar (Arlington, WA) said: “It can sense automatically when to turn lights on and off, and even knows when to charge batteries and when to turn lights off when battery power is low.”
TSF attached the solar-array panels to poles and ran rigid conduit from the solar array down to the electrical-panel box and, subsequently, the signs. Each sign had its own charger.
Onsite construction
The sites were located in remote campus areas near its current signage. Altogether, the TSF team, along with numerous subcontractors, spent 12 weeks onsite to complete the project. The signs’ new construction required existing signs to be demolished.
The sites ranged in size from 0.25 to 0.67 acres. Each site presented numerous obstacles, such as dirt, tree and shrub removal. Between 100 and 150 tons of precast concrete were delivered and hoisted into place. The project required multiple precast caps, with the largest weighing 10 tons.
The two largest monument signs sit atop three or four steps, which were designed to accentuate their presence as monuments. The subcontractor made stamp impressions, which were completed using silicone molds, formed with the pattern Jacobs specified, to create a stone-like look. The TSF team handled the footings and installed four, 8W Lumascape LED lamps in custom housings with tempered-glass caps in each of the G1 and G2 monuments.
TSF contracted with Olympian Precast and Epic Construction for precast and masonry services. Olympian provided casting for the components which made up the linear portion of the monument signs and tower caps. Each sign includes five precast elements; Epic constructed the columns. Once constructed, Epic applied the granite. The TSF team built, assembled and installed large aluminum-composite, rectangular wraps, built with 3A Composites’ Alucobond® material, to the face of each column.
The “G1” wrap measures 19 ft. tall, and “G2” reaches 15 ft. The large, red wraps provide visual enhancements by covering approximately two-thirds of the column faces to match school colors. On the wraps, we identified the founding year of the original Normal School, 1882, with 1-in.-thick, Steel Art (Boston) aluminum letters. The Alucobond material also provides an accent for the monument and tower capstones.
Risher said serving as a general contractor and supervising numerous subcontractors on the EWU project proved challenging. “Normally our operations are centralized,” he said. “This project challenged us to turn our procedures upside down while maintaining our standards of excellence. It consumed more resources than we estimated. We even had to fire a contractor for poor work.”
Despite the project’s challenges, it was still very worthwhile to help an institution of higher learning fulfill its mission to provide an environmentally friendly campus. And, probably most satisfying to all parties involved, we delivered the $429,000 project on time and under budget.
Equipment and Materials
Coatings: Grip-Gard®, two-part, self-etching primer, from Akzo Nobel Coatings (Norcross, GA), (770) 662-8464 or www.signfinishes.com; satin-finish, acrylic-polyurethane paint, from Matthews Intl. (Delaware, OH), (800) 323-6593 or https:corporateportal.ppg.com/na/refinish/matthews
Concrete and Granite: Structural concrete masonry units; natural, stone-cut granite; and precast concrete monoliths, caps and veneers, from Olympian Precast (Redmond, WA), (425) 868-1922 or www.olyprecast.com
Cranes: Dyna-Lift 80-ft. crane, from Dyna-Lift Inc. (Clearwater, FL), (800) 200-0898 or www.dyna-lift.com; Genie 125-ft. lift, from Genie Industries (Redmond, WA), (800) 536-1800 or www.genielift.com; 38-ton crane, from Coast Crane (Spokane, WA), (509) 535-4226 or www.coastcrane.com
LEDs/Lighting: Lumascape LS411LED Omnio Mini and LS793 LED lamps, from Pacific Lamp and Supply (Seattle), (206) 767-5334 or www.pacificlamp.com; Photovoltaic solar electrical components, from Rain City Solar (Arlington, WA), (206) 954-0380 or www.raincitysolarpower.com; red and white, V Series LED modules, from SloanLED (Ventura, CA), (888) 747-4533 or www.sloanled.com
Metal: Recycled-content aluminum sheet, from Ryerson Aluminum (Chicago), (773) 762-2121 or www.ryerson.com; red, 4mm Alucobond® composite material, from 3A Composites (Mooresville, NC), (704) 658-3500 or www.alucobondusa.com; one-in.-thick, waterjet-cut aluminum letters, from Steel Art (Boston), (617) 566-4049 or www.steelartco.com
Router: Dual-head, 6 x 10-ft., flatbed CNC router, from AXYZ Automation Inc. (Burlington, ON, Canada) (800) 361-3408 or www.axyz.com
Software: AXYZ Toolpath for Windows, from AXYZ Automation Inc.; ArtCam Express 2009, from Delcam Inc. (Windsor, ON, Canada), (877) 335-2661 or www.artcam.com; Omega Composer 3.6, from Gerber Scientific Products Inc. (Tolland, CT), (800) 222-7446 or www.gspinc.com
Welder: Millermatic 175 220V wire-feed welder, from Miller Weldmaster Corp. (Navarre, OH), (330) 833-6739 or www.weldmaster.com
More About The Sign Factory
The Sign Factory (Kirkland, WA) manufactures, installs and services electric signs. Jim Risher, president, started in the business as a three-year-old who grew up on the floor of his family’s shop, Northwest Neon and Plastic, which was founded in 1964. Over the years, the Risher family purchased several sign companies, including B&B Sign Co. (Missoula, MT).
In the summer of 1988, as Jim drove to Puget Sound from Montana, he envisioned the need for a company that could design and manufacture signs in-house from start to finish. He says the advantage of the turnkey process is brand consistency and competitive pricing while working on multiple locations.
The company offers wholesale production and project coordination regionally and nationally, as well as in Canada. Major customers include Macy’s, Safeway, Bank of America, Supercuts, Starbucks and Wells Fargo, as well as local architects, retailers, property managers and commercial developers.
Used Woodworking Equipment for Production Shops: Saws, Presses
A downloadable zip file that includes installable Toolpath version 2.9.0.6 and AMC OS 9.92. This version is compatible with Windows 7. A Windows 7 compatible USB converter is required, see part number 23117.Return policy does not apply to downloadable software products which, once ordered, cannot be returned or ref. No exact matches found for 'axyz toolpath windows 7'. Results for similar searches are shown below. Students must verify their toolpaths and run a collision check in RhinocAM before. The software associated with the Daniels cnc machine is called Rhinocam. This is a plug-in for. You must use axyz-router as the post processor in Rhinocam.
We buy & sell pre-owned woodworking equipment. We also help you to sell your used equipment, and help you save on equipment that you may need. All Items are sold 'As Is'. Although we strive to obtain the best information from the seller, AIM is not responsible for inaccuracies provided to us by seller. It is the responsibility of the buyer to crosscheck information with seller or manufacturer regarding descriptions that appear in this catalog.
Do you have Questions? Feel free to our office at 330-405-9421, M-F, 10AM-5PM EST or Email us at info@skylinepictures.com
Section 5: Production Woodworking Equipment
UFE-505 AXYZ 4008 CNC Router w/ Roller Hold
This unit is in very good working condition
Replacement value $185,000
The option in the Save Toolpaths dialog's Machine file format list associated with the post-processor file is AXYZA2MCMM (.nc). I was able to save a Profiling toolpath using the AXYZA2MCMM (.nc) option to C:UsersPublicDocumentsArtCAM FilesToolpaths on my computer. Helicon Graphic Supply and Service. You have no items in your shopping cart.
Axyz Toolpath For Windows
Price $ 6,995
This item can be picked up in Vermont, or shipped by a freight company for an additional fee.
Axyz Toolpath For Windows 10
Michael-VT-3-9-11
Information below from the manufacturer:
The AXYZ 4000 Series CNC Router is one of the most popular sizes for CNC Routers. The 4000 Series offers a processing width of 57” and processing lengths starting at 48”, 96” and every 24” after that. Like all AXYZ Series machines, the 4000 Series is capable of handling the widest range of tooling and application options in the industry.
Well suited for a wide range of industry applications, the 4000 Series presents the opportunity to easily process materials in excess of 4’ wide, and virtually any length you may work with. The Standard 6” gantry clearance and 10” ball screw Z stroke allows for thicker substrates to easily be loaded and unloaded from the working area. The convenient operator console provides the machine level interaction with the AXYZ Control system and at the heart of the AXYZ control network, providing high speed data processing capability, and motion control that is second to none.
If workloads require, the machine can be fitted with AXYZ Automation's Automatic Tool Change (ATC) facility and this incorporates an eight-position carousel. The ATC facility provides a faster, easier and more convenient way of processing work requiring multiple tooling without operator intervention and by ensuring that the correct tools for a given task are always selected. The router is supported with the multi-featured ToolPath software from AXYZ that will connect with a choice of CAD, CAS and CAM systems that can export DXF, HPGL or NC file formats. Designs can also be created in Vectorworks and exported as DXF files.
The 4000 Series of CNC Routers from AXYZ International are commonly found in Signmaking, Woodworking, Plastic Fabrication, and Metal Fabrication industries. Business owners and production managers appreciate the relative cost / value relationship in the 4000 Series machine, along with the nominal floor space required to install and run these high quality machines.
Technical Data:
Standard Processing Width: 1520 mm
Standard Processing Length: 2480 mm
Optional Additional Length: 600 mm Increments
Standard Gantry Clearance / Z Stroke: 150 mm
Optional Gantry Clearance Drive System: X, Y - Rack and Pinion, Z - Ballscrew
Speed: 5HP, 24,000 RPM, Elte Spindle
Control System: 7 Segment Motion Profile, FPGA processor for high speed complex calculations, Dedicated true NC control - G and M codes, Ethernet connection, 2 Gig onboard memory.
Always check with manufacturer as to any differences between what is shown and manufacturer's information listed above. We reserve the right to correct clerical or specification errors at anytime.
We Accept: Visa/MasterCard/Discover/Debit/Certified Check or Money Order
Produced By: A.I.M. Enterprises, Inc. phone: 330-405-9421
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