Custom Workshop Sign: Kiln Dried Poplar Signage

I had the great honor to make BA’s custom workshop sign using kiln dried poplar, the results came out fantastic as usual for this one of a kind piece!

CNCROi.com has greatly expanded its wood capabilities over the past year, 2018 was a breakthrough year on a number of fronts and getting into the live edge business was really one of those things I always wanted to do but until I got my full sheet CNC router, something I was always on the sidelines looking into rather than DOING.

One of the first projects I did regarding live edge custom signage was this house number sign which was just so much fun to make, I knew I had to do many more as soon as it was done.

Since then, our awesome CNC router, in conjunction with our amazing CNC laser have made a number of house number signs but this was the first custom workshop sign I made in the shop and it was just so much fun to make that I got to make more of those too!

When I first started CNCROi.com, I wanted to have built-in redundancy, it’s important to be able to use the best tool for any given job and along those lines, this redundancy also means that there are new avenues for being efficient along the way.

Any wood species, hardwood or softwood, can be shaped and molded by CNCROi.com to create the custom branding and signage requirements you have, regardless of the application you wish to use it for.

For instance, I now have an electric hand planner in addition to two CNC router machines to help make flattening boards way faster regardless of their size or proportions, one doesn’t replace the other, they complement one another and some of that came in hand for this custom workshop sign.

I’m marking the board each step of the way because it was a little hard to see what areas were being flattened versus places not as this piece of kiln dried poplar was “white” before and after removing material, a few sketches using a pencil immediately make sure that I don’t remove too much material while showing me the areas where some was removed.

This piece of live edge poplar had a bit of a hump in it, and it was also warped so the most efficient way to get a custom workshop sign out of it was to cut it roughly to size then flatten it using my full sheet CNC router though it could have fit on my far smaller one just as easily.

Sometimes the live edge boards we get into our shop are already flat, but having the capabilities to do this in-house allows us a lot more flexibility and way faster turnaround time compared to what we did before at CNCROi.com.

There was about a quarter-inch lip on one side of the live edge poplar, so that’s what I used the electric planner to remove, hence the marks you see in the top of the image below, this saved me quite a bit of programming and machine time as now I was flattening more of the board instead of previously at CNCROi.com, having to flatten mostly nothing for the first few passes.

When it comes to solid wood house number signs, CNCROi.com has the experience to make it memorable and into something that can be passed on for generations to come.

I really enjoy flattening live edge, each piece is unique and has its own story and the patterns revealed are just neat, the results are spectacular because even the roughest board looks totally amazing after it’s been cleaned-up and flattened.

Once both sides of this live edge custom workshop sign were flattened, the board is ready for the next step of production, our CNC laser to create a darkened contrast with the customer’s message by using the wood’s own charcoal, this means it will never fade, crack of peel off as the wood itself it the material used to create the imagery and text on this signage.

Truth be told, making these custom live edge signs isn’t a job to me, it’s a passion that I really enjoy making each and every step along the way at CNCROi.com for our customers worldwide.

I really enjoy the process of starting from essentially a log and then finishing-up with a wonderful custom workshop sign (in this case), there is nothing as great as a totally flat piece of real solid wood to do laser work with as the results are even through-on-through.

CNCROi.com‘s continued investment in capabilities allows us to maintain our 24 hour turnaround on most projects we do in the shop, whether custom workshop signage or live edge house number signs, it makes no difference, if we have the wood in stock, we get it out to you ASAP once the design parameters are established.

When it comes to your branding requirements on custom wooden (or other material) signage, the options are endless, any font, any size, any shape, any imagery, you tell CNCROi.com what you want and CNCROi.com makes it, it’s that easy!

Unlike our amazing CNC router, the laser isn’t limited by bit diameter, which means the text and imagery can be a thousand DPI so even the sharpest corner or smallest detail is precise and defined, plus the laser gives us free permanent contrast on the custom workshop sign for free.

You can see the waves of laser vaporized poplar coming-up from the custom workshop sign below, each pass by our industrial wide-format CNC laser instantly gasifies the surface of the live edge surface so while this job was being made, the shop smelled like a camp fire.

If metal is more your flavor, CNCROi.com has you covered on that front as well, from industrial grade 316SS…

To painted thinner gauge steel, CNCROi.com make it all just for you!

As this is a Poplar live edge custom workshop sign, there was no need to mask it, it sands wonderfully by default as it’s a very light weight and softwood, unlike Oak which would take forever to sand the vaporized smoke and resins off the surface of the custom wood signage.

You’ll notice I gave myself references on this live edge custom workshop sign design so that I knew exactly where to cut to maintain a square look to the entire custom Poplar signage, as a result, no measurements or tricky woodwork was required, just easy cutting all corners and be done with it.

You can begin to gain some appreciation for the thickness of this live edge custom workshop sign, it has a presence to it that just isn’t possible using typical lumber you get at the store.

Cedar, Oak, Maple, Basswood, Cherry… you name the wood species, we can make a custom wooden sign out of it, including man made materials such as Corian.

After this Poplar custom workshop sign is finished, you can see what the finished piece will look like, now that all the other woodworking is finished, it’s time to begin the final clean-up which includes sanding the front, back and sides.

As you can see, Poplar cleans-up really nice, it’s amazing how something so beautiful can come out of a piece of kiln dried live edge that has much to be desired when it comes to esthetics, under all that rough sawed board there is a diamond in the rough that CNCROi.com had the honor to liberate and show to the world!

Regardless of the angle, this custom workshop sign looks fantastic and I can’t wait to make another one!

Here’s a close-up, notice the grain pattern follows through the laser engraving, and how consistent this piece of live edge Poplar has been when it comes to the engraving, no ink on this at all, only wood and its own charcoal is what created this amazing contrast.

Want a custom live edge workshop or house number sign?

Contact CNCROi.com right now!