Anyone know of a good bright open sign? Maybe programmable but not married to the idea
In my views, noting beats classic Neon.
But the newer LED technology is impressive, but before buying, take the time to learn what all the numbers mean, because not all LED signs are created equal when it comes to brightness, viewing angle, and all sorts of other stuff involved with them.
Many places by me have went to RGB LED Message centers, they are so bright they are becoming a traffic hazard at night by not being able to see the deer crossing the road near them because they blind you with fast obnoxious flashing. I find myself blocking the sign with my hand so I can see the road. It sort of defeats its purpose IMO.
Now after saying that, I am looking for an affordable monochrome electronic message center
I agree on both points. LED technology has come a long way. Really it has simply become more common so you can get brighter lights at a lower cost. The earlier signs just weren’t bright at all. I also think that neon is the way to go. It is brighter and has a nostalgic allure to me that can’t be matched by LED. LED is cheaper though. Initially and long-term. And LED isn’t nearly as fragile.
well we bought an LED ‘open’ sign that has several clicks either just OPEN, or the letters turn on one by one O, then P, then E, then N then they go out and start over again, and I can’t recall the third light setting, then off…
In our experience, since we are in a very rural county, our power has to be sent over a mountain to get to our county, and we suffer from power outages the likes I never experienced before in my life, (the latest are from the summer forest fires, and now the dead trees just topple over from the weight of wet snows) This has been happening with such frequency it would blow your mind… quite a few of the LED’s have been burned out of our sign by these power surges from the brownouts and so, LED is still fragile in my experience… (WHICH by the way, we were fortunate that this last outage occurred on days we were not open for business! 18 hours without power… lucky for us its winter, I’d hate to think what losses in food we would have had if it were Summer. And we’re counting our blessings it didn’t happen during our regular open hours.)