Signage & Displays

Honeysuckle Creek was a NASA tracking station near Canberra that provided the first pictures of the Apollo 11 moonwalk on July 21, 1969. As well as television pictures, Honeysuckle Creek and Tidbinbilla had voice and telemetry contact with the lunar and command modules.

The tracking station closed in December 1981, and now only the concrete foundations remain. An outdoor sculptural display was added to the site in 2001 to celebrate the first moon landing. Screenmakers was involved in the space-junk themed display from the start, and has recently done further work to commemorate this significant event's 40-year anniversary.

The most recent item added to the display celebrates 40 years since the first moon landing. It is a bollard entry sign with a plaque at the top, digitally printed directly on to stainless steel, then clear-coated and mounted on a fabricated rusted steel display sign. At the bottom is a digitally printed graphic panel, printed on 3mm aluminium that was two-pack spray painted then direct printed and clear coated to protect against vandalism before being adhesive-fixed to the bollard. The bollard itself was cut out of 6mm steel plate and water-jet cut to get the shape. It has welded fins on the back for structural support and is concreted to the ground on a starter bolt base plate system.

Screenmakers has recently replaced the spaceship console display, as it had suffered severe vandalism and damage over the years. The new display was made from the original drawings, and contour-cut on the router to get the curved shape. It was then two-pack painted, digital printed and clear over-coated before being mounted to the structural bollard on site.

Four mini-bollards giving information about the moon have been located on the exact site of the original tracking dish, actually mounted on to the old starter bolts. The original footing positions can still be seen. A decorative stainless steel column in the middle indicates where the centre of the dish would have been.

Mask and spray vinyl cut graphics were applied directly to the huge steel panels before the rusted effect was created. All other graphics panels were made from 3mm aluminium cut to shape, powder-coated and screen-printed in full colour and spot colour. All the panels were then clear-coated with a special anti-graffiti coating and mounted to the rusted back panels with concealed fixings. After completing all the graphics, the panels were then craned into position and bolted to prepared pads on site. The result is a low-maintenance, durable display that blends in beautifully with the surrounding parkland.