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Re: food safe neon coating

Posted By: George Vidas
Date: Wednesday, 25 September 2013, at 8:19 p.m.

In Response To: Re: food safe neon coating (SVP Neon Equipment)


> I will add my $0.02.

> In the early 80's I was making all kinds of
> "unusual colors". Purple and
> lavender were a couple of my favorites (long
> before purple was introduced to the
> industry), and I even did brown one time,
> though that was not as good of a color as
> you might think. I would lay out the glass
> face up on saw horses (not a table top),
> connect it to a conventional transformer and
> spray it with the type of translucent paint
> that is used for plastic sign faces (several
> brands). A word of caution here: Don't spray
> it by trying to follow the neon around. You
> will end up with thick and thin spots. Spray
> it like you would the hood of a car; back
> and forth in an even over-lapping pattern.
> The reason to have the glass lit is because
> the more coats of paint you put on, the
> darker it gets. So this way you can see the
> depth and darkness of color as you go along.
> Be sure to thoroughly clean off the glass
> with solvent before painting. After painting
> you have to be similarly careful when
> handling and mounting as you would with the
> "made for neon" dipping paint as
> it will easily scrape off the glass. But
> once mounted and left alone, it will last
> for years.

> Regarding the dipping paint, you do not need
> to fill a big tank. All you need is enough
> to pour over the face of the glass. If the
> back is going to be dipped to block out, it
> doesn't matter if the back doesn't get
> coated with color. I have known a few shops
> who have done this with good results (or at
> least as good as you can get with this
> stuff). They set the piece to be painted in
> a tray only so they can reclaim the paint
> that runs off. Again, thoroughly clean the
> glass before painting.

> Mark

If I were doing this (which I'm not), I would play around with thinned silicone. Odorless mineral spirits + silicone in a screw-top jar, shaken. I suspect black silicone will thin out to a nice "smokey bar" tint.

Substantially cheaper than $16/can consumer-grade tool dip.


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