I wanted to make a custome vintage looking wood sign. One like you might see in an old town on the side of a brick building or out front on a fence. I wanted to look like it was hand made, weathered and not perfect, but readable.

Supplies

Pallet wood, wood boards, wood planks

Wood Screws

Screw driver

Paint, primer, colors and paint brushes

Jig saw, wood blade

Metal wire

Roto-Zip (Hand router) with 'V' bit

Metal chain, hammer, (optional)

Step 1: Design Your Sign: Size, Shape and Verbage

I did a simple sketch to get an idea of what I wanted my sign to look like. You can add details and make sure your signs width and height is big enough to account for the words and symbols you might want on the wood sign.

Step 2: Build the Wood Sign

I used two large wood boards removed and recycled from a pallet. Approximately 5 feet by 1 foot and one inch thick. I doubled them up by screwing two scrap pieces of wood to join the boards together on the back. When doing this joining of the planks, now is the time to run a metal wire from one side of the joining plates. I screwed in the metal wire after wrapping the ends a few times around the screw and then sinking them into the wood. Now woul;d be the time to cut any details into the sign. I cut the top corners to make the sign top rounded, but you can do any cuts you may like.

Step 3: Add the Art Work

I roughly added my blocking lines and hand drew all of the letters and tried to space them out with some rough spacing lines. The art work was all drawn by hand and no stincles were used. If you want a more professional looking sign I would recommend using a stencil and measure everything with a 'T' square and ruler.

Step 4: Router Out the Art Work

Now with the V shaped router bit, I slowly went over all the pencil lines and carved out the art work and text. Work slowly and wear protective eye glasses, a good filter breather as there is chemicals in the pallet wood that you do not want to breath.

Step 5: Primer and Paint

After you have gone over all your lines witht he router, clean off the saw dust and wipe out all details so you have a clean dust free surface to paint on. I primered the sign first because i wanted to have a base coat for the other colors to have a good base. This helps the color pop and also keeps the wood from absorbing the paint. I used white for the letters and details.

Step 6: Weathering Optional

After the paint was dry, I took a metal chain, a hammer, and a screw driver and hit, whipped, scrapped and poked the front of the sign to make it look a bit more weathered and older. Setting it in the sun and rain can also do the same think but it will just take a longer time for the weathered look. My sign is hung on my wall in the garage above my 1956 BMW R50 motorcycle.