Tron Neon - The Repair Thread

KillerKades

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The first sign arrived broken. The outer blue border was broken on both the top and bottom pieces of glass. Notified Gu and he said he would ship out another.

The replacement (2nd) sign also arrived broken. Both the outer blue border and the next red ring were broken. Notified Gu and I think he just threw in the towel. He refunded the payment. He also indicated in the email that 8 of the 10 he sent out got broken in shipment. Personally I think he put too much foam packing in between the tubes and any good amount of jostling put stress on the tubes that they just couldn't take.

Well, in the end I was refunded and found a local neon sign shop through a friend and was able to get both signs repaired. They made new glass for broken pieces. The new tubes are a bit larger in diameter than the tubes from Asia, but all in all still looks fine. Talked with the shop owner when I picked them up and he schooled me a bit on neon. Makes me wish I would have gone directly to them in the first place. Now I am thinking what do I want him to make next. :D

Well here are the signs repaired in all their glory and a close-up of the tubes to see if you can see the difference.

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What kind of info did he give you about neons from your schooling?

The color red is actually neon gas. All the other colors are argon gas. Each tube that has argon gas has a mercury ball in the tube somewhere. It usually will hang out near one of the ends or electrode. There was a dim part of the Tron lettering when we plugged them in when I went to pick them up. He tapped on the tube and showed me the mercury ball and articulated the sign so the mercury ball went to the dim area. Once the ball ran through this area it brightened right up like magic. It was pretty cool to see that. Just learned some cool things about neon signs in general.
 
The color red is actually neon gas. All the other colors are argon gas. Each tube that has argon gas has a mercury ball in the tube somewhere. It usually will hang out near one of the ends or electrode. There was a dim part of the Tron lettering when we plugged them in when I went to pick them up. He tapped on the tube and showed me the mercury ball and articulated the sign so the mercury ball went to the dim area. Once the ball ran through this area it brightened right up like magic. It was pretty cool to see that. Just learned some cool things about neon signs in general.

Heh... cool. :)

I have a couple dim areas that I'll try running the mercury through to see if it helps.
 
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