A channel letter raceway does two main jobs. It houses electrical components—including power supplies, wiring, and fasteners—and allows installers to mount a complete set of channel letters as one unit instead of hanging each letter individually.
Excellart Sign Products offers three channel letter raceway profiles: CLRW Slim, CLRW Five, and CLRW Seven. Each serves the same basic purpose. The difference is how much interior space the project requires for power supplies, wiring, mounting hardware, and future service access.
Start With What Needs to Fit Inside
Before choosing a channel letter raceway size, start with the project’s electrical and installation requirements.
Consider the size of the letters, the dimensions and number of power supplies, the wiring layout, the mounting hardware, and how much working room the installer will need inside the raceway. Larger letters, multiple power supplies, and more involved wiring layouts generally require more interior space. Smaller modern power supplies may allow the project to use a lower-profile raceway.
The goal is to choose the smallest raceway that still provides enough room to install, wire, mount, and service the letter set properly.
Built as a Complete Raceway System
ESP channel letter raceway profiles are extruded from domestically sourced 6063-T6 architectural-grade aluminum.
Each raceway uses a two-piece design consisting of the raceway body and a hinged lid. The lid opens to provide access to electrical components and fasteners while helping divert water away from the raceway’s interior.
The system also uses size-specific end caps and an ESP CLRW Mounting Bracket. The mounting bracket secures the raceway to the building and can also splice multiple raceway sections together when a run is longer than a single extrusion.
Together, these components keep the channel letters grouped into one clean assembly from fabrication and wiring through final installation.
CLRW Slim: A Low-Profile Channel Letter Raceway
CLRW Slim is ESP’s narrowest channel letter raceway profile, measuring approximately 5 inches tall by 3 inches wide.
Slim was designed around the smaller power supplies commonly used in modern channel letter systems. When the power supplies and wiring fit within a tighter footprint, Slim creates a lower-profile installation while still allowing the letters to be mounted as one unit.
Start with Slim when the project does not require the additional wiring and service space provided by CLRW Five or CLRW Seven.
CLRW Five: More Width and Working Room
CLRW Five measures approximately 5¼ inches tall by 5 inches wide.
Its 5-inch width provides more room for power supplies, wiring, mounting hardware, and service access. Compared with Slim, CLRW Five creates additional interior working space without moving to the taller CLRW Seven profile.
For many channel letter projects, CLRW Five is the middle-ground option: more working room than Slim with less overall height than Seven.
CLRW Seven: The Most Interior Space
CLRW Seven is ESP’s tallest channel letter raceway profile, measuring approximately 7½ inches tall by 5 inches wide.
Seven is the best fit when the project requires the most working room inside the raceway. That may include larger channel letter sets, multiple power supplies, heavier wiring layouts, or installations where service access and room for future electrical changes are priorities.
On larger or more wiring-intensive projects, the additional interior space can make fabrication, installation, and future service easier.
Find the Right Sign Cabinet for Your Project
Use the Excellart Kit Finder to answer a few project questions and find the right kit configuration. For project-specific questions, or just to chat contact the Excellart team at (800) 627-9044 or hello@excellart.com.