AAA Sign Co. in Boise: From 1944 To Present

Originally opened in 1944, AAA Sign Co. in Boise, ID, has weathered the winds of time and etched its place into sign-making history.

Owner Paul Ashley got his start in the sign industry during World War II painting signs and sandblasting submarines for the Navy. At the tail end of the war, he was able to realize his dream of opening a sign shop with help from his brother John, who operated an auto-repair business under the same roof.

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After the war ended, AAA Sign Co. established itself as the go-to sign shop for businesses and residents in the area. As the business grew, Paul became known for many of the landmark signs in the city.

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According to Allen Haumann, Paul’s Grandson, “Grandpa had zero fear of heights. His sons (my father and uncle), however, were both TERRIFIED of them. He’d drag ’em up on scaffolding to help him on weekends anyway. Grandpa probably believed in total immersion therapy.”

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For 50 years, AAA Sign Co. served the Boise and surrounding areas as a full-service sign shop, specializing in billboards, gold leaf, neon, hand-painted, and electrical signs. Paul’s style of sign painting was considered groundbreaking and consisted of minimal use of borders and decoration, concentrating instead on letters and typography, specifically Alf Becker letter-form alphabets that were popular in Signs of the Times magazines back then.

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Sadly, Mr. Ashley passed away in 2001, leaving AAA Sign Co. to his grandson Allen. Today, AAA Sign Co. is managed by Boise local Justinian Morton, a historical restoration expert and vintage signmaker who has spent much of his time restoring the AAA Sign Co. building to its original condition.

208771_1979906500230_2649464_nJustinian Morton restoring the AAA Sign Co. building earlier this year.

“I spent as much time as I could restoring the building to what it looked like during World War II. Since it’s been open, I’ve made several hand-painted signs for local Boise businesses, all done in a variety of historical styles, Paul’s style among them”, says Justinian.

Coastal Enterprises would like to thank both Allen Haumann and Justinian Morton for help gathering these vintage photos and putting together this article about Paul Ashley and the historical AAA Sign Co.

For more information, please visit: www.justinianmorton.com, or check out this short video about Justinian and the AAA Sign Co.:

http://vimeo.com/29861858

970191_10151365997261946_1231575495_nA look inside the AAA Sign Co. today.

Allen and Billboard March 2 2011Paul’s grandson Allen in front of AAA Sign Co. in 2011

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Cal Poly Students Optimize Solar Cooking With Precision Board

A group of Cal Poly San Luis Obispo Engineering and Physics students recently took part in an amazing project designed to help residents of some of the world’s poorest locations cook food with solar energy.

Using the Scheffler Reflector concept (a large solar reflector that tracks the sun on a single polar axis, reflects the sunlight and concentrates it), Cal Poly students set out to make a reflector of their own that was less expensive and easier to manufacture. The present model with a reflector dish supported by a complicated aluminum matrix costs more than $4,000 to buy and ship from Germany.

The goal was to develop a working model that could be produced for less than $100. They planned to accomplish this by building a reflector dish that could be quickly and easily made from fiberglass cured over a mold.

To make the mold for the reflective dish, Precision Board HDU donated by Coastal Enterprises was CNC machined into a mold and coated with Duratec, followed by coats of polyester primer and sanding. The next step was a fiberglass hand-layup using fiberglass cloth and applying resin by hand.

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After letting the fiberglass cure in sunlight, students pulled the fiberglass dish from the mold to find its shape flawless. The new dish is to be coated with aluminized mylar and fit into the simplified frame. By keeping design for manufacturability in mind, students were able to create a realistic solar cooking solution for fuel-challenged regions of the world – the first produced in North America.

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According to Mechanical Engineering student and team member Simo Alberti, “The project was a huge success. Precision Board allowed us to quickly and easily create a highly-accurate mold for our reflector. When we totaled up what it cost to actually make our working prototype, it was just under $100. Not only that, but we used it to cook food all summer long. Kebabs, hot dogs, pasta, vegetables – as many types of food as we could.”

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The solar reflector program is the brainchild of Dr. Peter Schwartz, Physics Professor at Cal Poly SLO, and evolved out of his larger Guateca program. Guateca is an ongoing project that involves annual summer trips with North American college students to the Guatemalan village of San Pablo, and serves as a cross-cultural educational platform for both Guatemalans and the US visitors.

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According to Dr. Schwartz: “We plan to test the solar reflector in San Pablo this coming summer to see how it operates under real-world conditions. Additionally, our stateside goal is to produce 100 reflectors and see them operated locally so we can streamline our design based on feedback gleaned from the operators. Having the mold will greatly facilitate this task.”

Once the new inexpensive design is optimized, Dr. Schwartz plans to make the design public with the goal of encouraging eco-friendly, sustainable energy solutions worldwide. At the time of this publication, Cal Poly students had recently acquired an actual Scheffler Reflector for comparative research. They are also in communication with the people at Scheffler, who are very interested in this new design.

Additionally, through the SLO MakerSpace, http://www.sloidealab.com, one of the Cal Poly students plans to run a workshop where people can make their own concentrated solar cookers using the Precision board mold.

For more info about the fascinating Guateca project, please visit: http://www.guateca.com.

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This is a time-lapse video compiled by Simo during the construction of the Precision Board layup tool:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PMwaJJn5sZo&feature=share&list=UU0QHK7bLqOIXm8Xy0pGZOeA

 

Smooth move

Anytime we move a large piece it is always an exciting day.

 The day we move something this large it’s over the top! My client was handling the move so it was less stressful than usual. The load towed smooth, and at reasonable speeds it was stable and easy. The good news was we only had ten miles to go.

The tight turn up the steeper hill to the lake went without incident. 

When we arrived at the ale it took a few minutes to hook up the zoom boom. Thankfully, the feature balanced almost perfectly.

It was tight maneuvering as we squeezed between the trees but it went without a scratch.

We had to lift the feature and spin it to clear the pipes and conduits to set it into place. We were almost there!

The skilled operator carefully set it down as we guided it into position at the edge of the bumper boat pool.

The first piece of this massive project is now in place. The light house that will sit on top is now underway in the shop. This week I’ll begin the routing of the lettering that will fasten to the sign face. I’ll be documenting that process here for sure.
Over the next weeks and months we’ll be building and hauling many more to join it.
Stay tuned…

-dan

Published with permission from precisionboard.blogspot.com. Source.

Building and moving a small mountain

Sometimes creating a sign involves many disciplines with the routing part only a portion. One of our current projects is just such a piece. We’ve been working on it for more than a week and the routed portion is still a week distant. It will be the primary sign for the Cultus Lake Adventure Park. The sign will be jammed into a dirt bank. Large colorful rocks stick out. Greenery sprouts from the top as well as a tall lighthouse. Underneath the lighthouse a waterfall will tumble into the bumper boat pool below.

We started our welding in the shop but we could only take the work so far before we had to squeeze it back out the door. The balance would be done in our parking lot.
I test fir the upper structure for the lighthouse to make sure everything lined up perfectly.
Once the welding and attaching the lath was done we lifted the giant framework onto the trailer. it would be too heavy for our little forklift after we applied the concrete. At the other end of the journey they have a much bigger machine so unloading wouldn’t be a problem.
Then it was time to mud. We careful applied the fiberglass reinforced concrete, carving and shaping it as we worked our way downward.
The end result was pretty spectacular – the largest piece we have trailered so far. 

 Tomorrow it makes it’s journey to the worksite to be permanently installed. Our onsite work begins for real! We’ll begin work on the lighthouse tomorrow and also start the routing for the lettering that will be fastened to the sign face with standoffs.

Stay tuned…
-dan

Published with permission from precisionboard.blogspot.com. Source.

Pieces in progress

Other pieces I’ve documented in the last while are quickly getting polished off and moved out into the parking lot until they are transported up to the work site. Here’s a few shots.

In the shop other pieces are ready for paint or in various stages of base colors.
Stay tuned for more…
-dan

Published with permission from precisionboard.blogspot.com. Source.