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How Channel Letters Are Made

Business signs are an excellent tool for attracting consumers to your company and are crucial to making your brand recognizable. There are a lot of different signage options for businesses out there. One of the most popular choices for business signs is channel letter signs.

What Are Channel Letters?

Before deciding if channel letter signs are right for your business, you must first understand what channel letters are. Simply put, channel letters are 3D letters that are typically built with a back, sides (also called returns), and a face. The construction creates a hollow channel inside the lettering into which illumination is placed to create a lighted sign. Channel lettering can make your business sign stand out by improving its visibility during the day and night.

What Are Channel Letters Made Of?

If channel letters sound like they could be a good option for your business, the next thing it’s essential to understand is what they’re made of. After all, if you want to have a custom sign made for your business, it’s important to select the right materials. Typically, the sides or returns of the channel letters are made from sheet metal. Aluminum is generally considered to be the best option since it is lightweight and resistant to rusting. The back and face are often made from acrylic, though they can also be made from aluminum. Alternatively, you can forego the back and face altogether if you want the lighting element exposed. Generally speaking, the lighting is done with either LED lighting or neon lighting. Both work well, but LED lighting is more efficient and tends to be more popular as a result.

How We Fabricate Channel Letter Signs

While you don’t need in-depth knowledge of how channel letter signs are fabricated to make a good decision about your business’s signage, having a basic understanding will help you make an informed decision about what you want. Any aluminum used to create the sign will need to be cut, bent, and shaped into the right shape by using some pretty heavy-duty equipment. There are essentially two methods used when manufacturing channel letter signs. The first is by using handheld tools; the second is by using computer numerical control manufacturing. The second method tends to yield more precise results, keeping water from getting into your sign and damaging the lighting element.

How to Mount Channel Letters

Once you have your sign made, all that’s left is to have the channel letters mounted. There are a couple of different ways to mount channel letter signs. You can do a direct mount, which means mounting the characters directly to the wall where the sign is being installed. Alternatively, you can have raceway-mounted channel letters, a method involving the characters being mounted to an aluminum box, which is then attached to the building’s exterior surface. The option that works best for you will depend primarily on what is allowed in your zoning area and allowed by your landlord.

Since each character in a channel letter sign is usually manufactured and mounted individually, the process of aligning and mounting the characters should be performed by experienced professionals. After all, a poorly mounted channel letter sign can severely negatively impact the impression your sign makes on consumers. Here at Resource 4 Signs, we are experts when it comes to channel letter signs. We will mount the lettering on the building’s wall using the most appropriate method for your situation and ensuring that the characters are aligned perfectly.

Channel letters can be an excellent sign option for many businesses because they help a business stand out. To make sure that your channel letter sign is exactly what your business needs, take a closer look at the different ways your sign can be created and customized, as well as how the fabrication and mounting process is done. Knowing these basics will help you make the best decision for your business