Lumacurve Airfield Signs

Lumacurve is the airfield sign brand of Standard Signs, which Vern Messner founded in 1936 in Cleveland as a porcelain enameling business. After World War II Messner designed the first approved airfield guidance sign specification, the L-829 of 1955, and the company introduced Lumacurve in 1982 in response to the FAA's L-858 specification. Run by Messner's sons from the 1970s, it calls itself a fourth-generation family company and moved to its current plant in Macedonia, Ohio, south of Cleveland, in 2010. It names Chicago O'Hare, Atlanta Hartsfield and Los Angeles among airports using its signs.

Its signs use modular aluminum frames with a curved face meant to shed jet blast, and the frame length changes with the legend. Lighted signs are LED-only in three sizes, single- or double-faced; distance remaining signs include a Mode 3 design rated for jet blast up to 300 mph; unlighted billboard-style signs come in FAA sizes 1, 2 and 3 in 48- and 72-inch lengths. LED drop-in kits retrofit existing Lumacurve signs in about 20 minutes each. Products are listed as ETL-certified and built to FAA AC 150/5345-44, and a panel audit kit helps airports inventory existing signs.

Its Wait-Less service makes and ships replacement parts or a new sign within 24 hours after damage, with same-day shipping for calls placed before 10 a.m. Eastern, and it is open to airports that do not already use Lumacurve signs. New signs carry a three-year warranty. Pricing is not published; quotes are by phone or the contact page. Sign documents and a Help Yourself section for maintenance staff are on the site. It does not single out products for smaller GA fields.