Laser Rock Setting

[Eric Seest]

I have customer wanting some rocks engraved so I purchased some laser rocks from laserbits; but now my question is what type of settings should I use (60Watts). Also do these need to rastered or vectored. I have tried other stones in the past with poor results so I am hoping these work better. Any ideas?

[George D Gabert]

Laser bits has a tech paper on laser rocks at http://www.laserbits.com/images/pdfs/laserstone.pdf

Try this

GDG

[Eric Seest]

Thanks, I looked for it but must have overlooked it. Well once again the SMC saves me.

[Anthony Scira]

Hmmmm those "laser" stones look a lot like the river rock you can get from your local building supply. I hope they don't charge extra for them ;)

[Bill Cunningham]

Those are just tumbled granite.. The coloured ones are tumbled marble.. The settings you would normally use for granite will work with the gray ones, the marble settings will work with the marble ones.. You can also buy the marble ones in a lot of dollar stores, petshops, and craft stores, and yup, their called "river rocks" The one below is black marble
http://www.sawmillcreek.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=71227&stc=1&d=1188954357

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[Eric Seest]

I will have to give the river rocks a try, they don't cost as much. Well as long as my wife does not claim them; I tried one of hers from the house and it turned out nice until she found what I used, she was a little upset. Thanks for the information.

[John W. Love]

Home Depot sells a hernia size bag of them for about $20 or so. Can't remember for sure what the exact price I paid for them, but it wasn't much more than that I can assure you. The one downside is that some of the rocks are just a bit rough and not overly smooth. I probably got about 80% of them to look really good.
What I did was first pick through them and find the best of them, the rest went into what is now a rock garden in front of my mom's house. Then I washed them off as they are very dusty and have some dirt on them. Then I let dry and rubbed them with baby oil before engraving. The baby oil gives it a deep rich look. Then a light color fill and they looked great. Did them for teacher's end of the year presents. This was one of my first "paying" jobs that we did.

[Steve Clarkson]

J and/or A,

Thanks for the tip about the baby oil....I'll have to try that. Do you mask your rocks before colorfilling? I had to since the paint I used wouldn't come off.

[John W. Love]

Hey Steve,
This is John and yes we masked the rock with just masking tape. They came out really good, especially for our first project.
And remember, that baby oil goes a long way. What I did was just put a drop or two on my hands and rubbed it in, then just rubbed it over the rock. it kinda soaks into the "pores" of the stone and takes away that dull look that the natural stone has without sending it through a polisher.

[Bill Cunningham]

I guess the baby oil does the same thing as the usual wd-40 does.. Except of course you don't want to put wd-40 on the baby! :eek:

[John W. Love]

I guess the baby oil does the same thing as the usual wd-40 does.. Except of course you don't want to put wd-40 on the baby! :eek:

My grandad used to swear by WD-40 for his arthritis in his elbows and shoulders, he would spray it on and rub it in. Not sure if it really did any good but he felt better for it. So, maybe it is just the power of suggestion.

And if Olive oil comes from olives and peanut oil comes from peanuts.... where does Baby oil come from?