Rustic Motivation??e

Lot of things I would do differently on the second go round, but was a fun project none the less. When lumber prices jumped decided to put a bunch of old pallets to good use. Started out with a stock image of wolf howling. Had bunch left over plexi from previous project, all cut down to 8x8. Took those, broke the original image down, mirrored it, so etching would be on back.

The hard part was finding the signatures for each individual quote, converting to dxf file that was capable of being uploaded in CAM software. Then had to mirror them on back of pieces. All machining was slowly done with a 1/16" flat end mill or a 60 degree vcarve.

I would completely change design if started over, but I was just using material and lighting I had on hand. Don't pay attention to the light fixtures, was just throwing things up to see what worked best. In future I was use plexi with a slight blue tint, it reflects and projects the light better to make each quote stand out. Live and learn, probably tackle another one some day.

Tried to sharpen photos, just phone pics.

That is pretty cool.

What is attaching the plexi to the wood? the shadows and reflection from the lighting are playing tricks and I cannot see the mechanics.


I really like the concept. A coworker's wife is a bonified artist, and has done some similar stuff, but smaller scale. Yours is 10X upscale.

So had a bunch of strips of LED. I ripped a bunch of like .5x.5" with a .125x.125" slot in them for the plexi, then used dowel rods cut down to 1" to wood glue and brad nail. Problem is when the pallet wood is cut that small without acclimating it warps and bends the plexi glass. Second mistake is that the LED strips I had were non dimmable, and are way to bright. But in theory it would of been nice

you can see the dowel rod offsetting the plexi in third pic middle area

Neat idea