Primarily Petroliana Shop Talk Forums Shop Talk Petroliana Forums General Petroliana Discussion Who here has watched a porcelain sign being Fired??

I know of at least 2 members that have.
There is a bit of misinformation on here at times.. there are a few things about the process some are not realizing..

Just thought I would mention that.

I have seen castiron tubs having their porcelain applied.
They heat the tub red hot and shake the powder onto the tub.
The glass melts immediatly.....I have always wondered how a sign is done....never have seen that!

Frank

We are all ears if you want ot tell us or show us?

ward

Joe. are you sure they just poured it on, seems hard to get a consistent coat that way especially on the curved surface.

From what I have seen , usually frit is mixed with water, sprayed on and air dried, then fired. Sign can be hanging or on it side on racks.

The main point of the original post is that if a sign has crazing or cracking of the porcelain you may be able to save some of it if a sign is bent.. as well frit could be reapplied on chips etc..

I saw it with my own eyes...
The tub was on a roatating mount and one guy had a long pole with a Approx 20" dia end with a screen and the stuff was shaken through the screen.
It looked like powder till it hit the tub...then it melted...they might not do it that way now.

I watched the making & 'firing' of my Wayne 60, Wayne 70, MS 80 & Eco air meter faces at a local company which is now out of business. The faces were sprayed and then baked. The owner of the company made Ford oval neons, Mobil cookie cutters & Marvy barber shop signs along with thousands of others. He had a sign in his office with seven colors on it which he made back only three of back in the 30's for a movie theater in Iowa. I remember him telling me that he hand sprinkled the colors with a separate mask for each one.
Ron

I'm assuming that the signs get fired between each color, or is this not the case?

Wes

I watched my Boss get fired last week.
That was pretty cool.

bet that was great, mr pizza!

LOL..
"Mr.ODDVIOUS"

Each color is fired seperately, so in the case of a four color sign the primary background color is applied first. After the sign has cooled down to room temperature after being fired in the kiln a silkscreen is applied of the second color; the glass is applied again and the sign is fired in the kiln a second time and so on and so forth until the last secondary color is applied.

veery interesting really never knew how this was done