GARAGE: Vintage swiss Datsun dealer neon sign

I’ve always wanted to decorate my workshop & Garage with some authentic Vintage datsun signs or so, but they’re not exactly easy to come by.. So when this one popped up, i had to get it immediately. Yesterday i undertook a 6 hour drive to the other, french speaking side, of the country, to pick up this vintage dealer sign. Due to the language barrier and short time we had, i wasn’t able to figure out the history. But the seller had other, similar signs, so i guess it must have been part of a combination with other signs outside a dealership in the french speaking area of switzerland. Nevertheless. i loaded it into the back of my car and brought it home.

It’s basically an aluminum frame with a plexiglass front which has the datsun logo printed on it somehow (it doesn’t seem to be a vinyl sticker or so)

I wasn’t really sure if it’s working or not, and honestly i was expecting the inverters to explode when i power them up, simply to the fact that it hasn’t probably been used in decades. But this beeing an “industrial grade” outdoor sign, made by a well known swiss signmaking company, it just came alife as soon as i installed the cable and plugged it in. great!

Now i have to find a nice place for it, it is much bigger then what i expected when i bought it. but i love it 🙂 Probably will convert it to LED lighting before hangig it somewhere on the wall, to avoid a repair after a few working hours. This thing is big and it might e tricky to hang it somewhere, so it better should stay there forever 🙂

Update 02.03.2023: I just found a vintage photo of the “Autoro Garage” In Lucerne, which was an old Datsun Dealership, with such a sign installed: