Foam board is a slab of polystyrene with a smooth face bonded either side. It gives the flattest, sharpest printed panel of any rigid board we run, at almost no weight. Printed and cut at Ravenhall.
A sheet of foamboard is three layers. Closed-cell polystyrene foam in the middle, and a thin facing bonded to each side, usually clay-coated paper or thin plastic. The foam does nothing except hold the two faces apart, which is why the panel is so stiff for its weight. A 10mm A0 panel weighs less than a rolled poster and stands up on its own.
Made by Melbourne Trade Signs, a large-format print and signage company on Unit 6/43 Orbis Drive, Ravenhall VIC 3023, in Melbourne’s west. Printed in-house and installed Australia-wide. Phone 0415 743 691.
The reason to choose it is print quality and weight. The face is smooth and bright, so photographs and fine type look better here than on any rigid stock. The reason not to is moisture. Paper faces take up humidity at different rates front and back, and the panel bows. Outdoors it is finished in a season. For anything that sees rain we quote corflute or PVC instead.
Printing and cutting both happen at our Orbis Drive workshop in Ravenhall. Flatbed cutting gives shaped panels and clean square edges with no saw marks, and there is no minimum, so a single mounted print is as welcome as a two-hundred-panel expo fitout. Freight is worth planning: foam board is light, but corners dent, so it ships boxed and flat rather than stacked loose.
The choice is thickness and facing. Thickness decides whether the panel stands on its own. The facing decides how it copes with a humid room and how easily it dents.
| Board | Faces | How it behaves | Typical job |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5mm paper-faced | Clay-coated paper | Easy to cut, dents under a fingernail | Mounted photographs, point-of-sale panels, presentation boards |
| 10mm paper-faced | Clay-coated paper | Far stiffer across a span, still light | A0 display panels, easel-backed signs, exhibition graphics |
| 5mm plastic-faced | Thin polystyrene skins | Holds shape in humid rooms, wipes clean | Doorway displays, hospitality menus, food areas |
| 10mm plastic-faced | Thin polystyrene skins | The most stable board we run | Panels up for months, or touring venues |
| Black-core board | Black paper, black foam | Cut edge reads dark, not white | Gallery mounting, dark artwork, exposed edges |
| Self-adhesive | One face pre-glued | A print rolls on without a laminator | Mounting supplied prints and presentation panels |
Custom sizes cost the same to cut as standard ones, so order what the space needs. The thing to watch is nesting: three panels each measuring just over half a sheet will use three sheets, not one and a half.
Foam board choices are mostly about mounting. The panel weighs so little that it hangs off things a heavier sign never could, which opens up options in leased spaces where you cannot drill.
The standard for mounted prints and anything going into a frame or sitting on a shelf. It cuts crisply, posts cheaply and holds a flat face across A1. Past that size it flexes under its own weight when lifted by one corner, which is when to step up.
Twice the thickness, barely more weight, far more resistance to bowing. This is what free-standing panels, A0 conference boards and anything with an easel back should be printed on. It also survives being carried around a venue by a volunteer, which 5mm often does not.
The brighter, smoother face and the better print result: whites read cleaner and fine type holds together. It is also the fragile option. It marks easily, will not take a wet cloth, and responds to room humidity by curling towards the drier side.
Polystyrene skins instead of paper. The print is fractionally less bright but the panel is far more stable, shrugs off a damp cloth, and copes with a foyer that gets a blast of outside air each time the door opens. The pick for hospitality.
Flatbed cutting follows any outline you can draw: logo silhouettes, arrows, product shapes, life-size cut-outs and internal windows. Keep narrow sections above about 20 mm wide, because foam board has no tensile strength and a thin neck snaps when somebody lifts the panel.
A folding strut on the reverse turns a flat panel into a free-standing counter display, practical to about A1 in 10mm. On walls, self-adhesive hook-and-loop pads or magnetic tape hold a panel with no holes at all, which is how most leased sites put signage up.
Shelf talkers, gondola end panels, window cards and product cut-outs for a promotional period. Store staff put them up and take them down without tools, and a full set posts to twenty sites for about the cost of freighting one rigid sign. Franchise groups order one master run and split it from a single delivery to head office. Reorders come back off the same cut file.
Poster boards, registration signage, sponsor panels and directional signs inside a venue. Light enough to hang from an existing frame or lean on a stand, and cheap enough that nobody worries about getting it home afterwards. Where the same event also needs banners, walls and outdoor signage, our sister company Event Signs handles that end. Panels post flat in a single box.
Mounting prints for exhibition, hanging work without glass, and producing wall labels and caption panels. Black-core board is the usual specification here, so the cut edge does not read as a white line beside the image. We can print direct to the board, or mount a print you already have onto self-adhesive stock. Send us the exact print size before ordering the board.
Notice boards, internal wayfinding, process and safety panels in a lunchroom, and display work along school corridors. Foam board suits interiors where the message changes each term or each quarter, because replacing a panel costs very little. Removable pads mean the old one lifts off cleanly at the end of a term or a campaign, with no paint repair and no holes left in the wall.
Foam board shows detail that other rigid boards flatten out, so a proper file is worth supplying. Fine type, gradients and photographic skin tones all hold together on this face.
You do not need print-ready files to start. Send the logo, the wording and a rough sketch of what sits where. Setting the artwork up is part of the job, and you see a proof before anything is cut.
Printing, laminating and cutting are all ours, so a foam board job slots into our own queue rather than waiting on somebody else — urgent boards can often be handled as same day printing. Give us the date it has to be on the wall and we will be honest about it. Collection from Ravenhall suits small quantities. Anything shaped or large we would rather box and deliver around metro Melbourne.
No. Not for an afternoon, not under an awning, and not with a laminate on it.
Paper faces take up moisture from the air and lift away from the foam core. Even plastic-faced board moves at a different rate to its core, so a panel left outside bows within days. Wind is the other issue: a light panel behaves like a sail and tears out its fixings.
Almost always uneven moisture. One face has taken up humidity the other has not, so it expands and the panel curls towards the drier side.
The usual causes are laminating one side only, leaning a panel against a cold external wall, and storing it flat on concrete overnight. Storing upright with air on both faces prevents most of it. A mild bow sometimes relaxes under even weight, but a lifted face will not.
Foam board is a rigid foam core between smooth facings and is strictly indoor. Corflute is hollow fluted plastic, weatherproof, and the standard for temporary outdoor signage.
Foam board prints better, because the face is flat and continuous rather than ribbed, so photographs and fine type stay sharp. It is also stiffer per millimetre. The trade-off is durability: corflute sits on a fence for a year, foam board fails in one wet morning.
Choose paper-faced when print quality matters most and the panel lives somewhere dry and stable. Choose plastic-faced when it gets handled, cleaned or moved between humid spaces.
A gallery label, a presentation board or a mounted photograph is a paper-faced job. A cafe menu panel, a display beside an automatic door, or a set travelling between sites is a plastic-faced job. The price gap is small next to reprinting a warped set.
Removable hook-and-loop pads or low-tack mounting strips are the usual answer, and they hold easily because the panel weighs so little.
On painted plasterboard, spread several small pads across the back rather than using two large ones, so no single point pulls at the paint on removal. Avoid double-sided foam tape on freshly painted walls, since it lifts paint that has not cured. In leased retail, magnetic tape onto shopfitting is cleanest.
Yes. Flatbed cutting handles contours, internal windows and full figure cut-outs, and 10mm board with a strut back will stand one up.
The limit is structural rather than technical. Foam board has no strength in tension, so a narrow point, a thin ankle or a long unsupported arm breaks the first time someone lifts it by the wrong part. We thicken those areas in the cut path, or reinforce behind.
Still deciding? See our sign materials guide.
The weatherproof alternative. Not as sharp to look at, and the flutes show under the print, but it handles rain, sun and temporary fencing without complaint.
See the detail →The same artwork on paper or synthetic stock for frames, light boxes and window display, for when the panel does not need to be rigid at all.
See the detail →Expanded PVC board. A similar flat printed face and a similar weight to foam board, but it copes with damp, regular cleaning and outdoor use.
See the detail →Browse the full list on our A–Z of everything we print, or see how this fits into signage in Melbourne.
Tell us the size, the quantity and the room it is going in. We will confirm the right board and send a price within two business hours.