Awning Replacement

[well33t]

Hi, I own a sign shop and I mostly do lettering on cars and shop. I have a customer who want to replace his green old awning vinyl to matte black. Is it hard to do ? Any how to I can find ?

Thanks !

Seb

 

[Johnny Best]

You could paint that with some flat black latex paint, but I would tell him to have an awning company put a new cover on it, then you could put graphics on for him. Would look a lot nicer and professional.

 

[well33t]

Is it that complicated, I mean I just need to get the material stretch in place ? Why would I hire someone else to do it if I can learn it !

 

[Johnny Best]

If you are going to do it yourself then you need to take it down, remove old material and buy new matt black vinyl material and stretch (your words) it back onto the frame in your shop on a large table or a set up to handle that size frame, then reinstall.
Making awnings is a trade like signs, you have to know what you are doing to make it look nice. Better to get awning professionals to do the job. That looks like the old Milliken staple system style type awning. Good luck.

 

[Gino]

Not sure, but that looks like egg cartons under that awning, therefore, it's probably backlit. Is it ??

That might be an eradicated awning. You hafta tell us. You're in an altogether different ballgame if it is.

 

[hcardwell93]

You will want to sub it out. I do awning work and its definitely its own art form to learn.

But since you asked heres what you need:
Fabric pliers, cloth shears, appropriate staple gun, air hammer and air compressor. 2 dozen welding clamps. Staples, fabric, and zip strip.

Steps: remove egg crate and lighting. Take the awnings down and transport to your shop. The proper way for transportation is screwing them to the deck of a flat trailer with Z brackets. You cant strap them down.

Cut away all fabric except for about 1 inch around each channel. Remove the old zip strip. If the material is not dry rotted use your fabric pliers to start pulling the 1 inch strips out. Pull hard since it is stapled in. Once that's out you want to hammer down any staples that are raised up.

Cut your fabric with 4 inches of bleed. Staple in one side. Flip it over and use the welding clamps to tension the other side. Do this for all areas. Grab the air hammer and hammer in the zip strip.

You can power wash the egg crate or buy new ones if it's in too bad of shape. Doing graphics depends on the fabric used...

Screw them back into the trailer and reverse the steps from taking them down.

 

[visual800]

sub it out to an awning company. This has to be backlit. now if you wanna save money go ahead and take it down yourself and remove the material and lights

 

[Johnny Best]

I would love to see this OP take down what is there and stretch new flat black material on, reinstall it, take a pic of what a great job he did while learning at the same time and tell us how it was not complicated.
In a perfect world: Got a 50% deposit, payment on finishing, no messages to owner threatening to take awning down for not paying, and everyone is happy, and last but not least, his HP printer has no problems. Thank God we don't have to hear about that.

 

[Billct2]

Just follow hcardwell's great instructions and take some pics so we see how it worked out.

 

[well33t]

You will want to sub it out. I do awning work and its definitely its own art form to learn.

But since you asked heres what you need:
Fabric pliers, cloth shears, appropriate staple gun, air hammer and air compressor. 2 dozen welding clamps. Staples, fabric, and zip strip.

Steps: remove egg crate and lighting. Take the awnings down and transport to your shop. The proper way for transportation is screwing them to the deck of a flat trailer with Z brackets. You cant strap them down.

Cut away all fabric except for about 1 inch around each channel. Remove the old zip strip. If the material is not dry rotted use your fabric pliers to start pulling the 1 inch strips out. Pull hard since it is stapled in. Once that's out you want to hammer down any staples that are raised up.

Cut your fabric with 4 inches of bleed. Staple in one side. Flip it over and use the welding clamps to tension the other side. Do this for all areas. Grab the air hammer and hammer in the zip strip.

You can power wash the egg crate or buy new ones if it's in too bad of shape. Doing graphics depends on the fabric used...

Screw them back into the trailer and reverse the steps from taking them down.

thanks for the quick how to. Even if I decide not doing the job i'm happy to understand the process so I can understand what's the amount of the job to do and then explain the quote to my customer .