tempered, beveled glass engraving

[Devon Jones]

i know i prob did not spell all of that right but oh well.

ok so i was asked to start playing with glass and the laser i have a few hundred pieces of scrap glass and wanted to know if anyone has any settings or things they do to it that they like......


is there something i can rub over it to fill the part that is engraved?

will tempered glass shatter if i try to engrave it?

how deep should i go to make it look good?

do you mirror the image for best results?


thank you

[James Stokes]

There are many different threads on engraving glass do a search and you should find all of the information you seek

[Dan Hintz]

Devon,

You won't get much depth at all, but you can colorfill with a lot of things (paint, Rub'n'Buff, etc.). You shouldn't have a problem with tempered glass. Mirroring is up to you and will depend upon the application... for thin glass I'd etch on the front, for thicker stuff I'd etch on the back.

For glass you'll want to go relatively slow with a lot of power. You have a hefty laser, so you could get away with a much faster scan... try 100S/85P as a starting point, but you may end up increasing the power.

[Gary and Jessica Houghton]

I love glass! It doesn't go very deep, but I don't have a laser as powerful as yours. I use lots of power with lower speed. I always try to etch the glass from the back. It gives it a much nicer look in my opinion. Naturally, glasses and bottles can't be etched from the inside. Keep in mind, we've found out by trial and error. You can buy blank glass from a local home builders supply, i.e. Home depot or any glass shops. I don't know about tempered glass. Never tried it.

[Devon Jones]

thanks for the help i ran one piece and you are right it does not go that deep i will do some more today and see what i can come up with thanks again

[Devon Jones]

i had one question is seems like when i laser glass it comes shows up kinda grainy is there a way to make it more smooth (did that make sense)

[nancy barry]

I find that using plain dish soap smeared over the image area improves the image quality a lot..

do a test:
laser the following words: use different fonts and sizes, bold, italic::
Plain
Wet Paper
Soapy paper
Soap

use a piece of glass for each of the above and compare the results. Once you have a look you like, play with power and speed..

If I want depth, I use laser mask and sandblast. This removes the graininess and gives enough of an indent for the RnB or other fill to stick to the glass..

CAUTION! going too deep on tempered glass could cause it to do what it is supposed to do: BREAK into small pieces.. Should not happen in the laser but CAN happen if sandblasted too aggressively...

good luck, nancyB

[Phyllis Williams]

When i do any kind of glass/crystal i use 20 speed / 85 power / 400 dpi / 50% black...glass does no chip...i am using a 45 watt TT by epilog 12x24

[Dale Davies]

When i do any kind of glass/crystal i use 20 speed / 85 power / 400 dpi / 50% black...glass does no chip...i am using a 45 watt TT by epilog 12x24
phyllis... or anyone else ...can you tell me why you use 50% black...thanks

[Dan Hintz]

Dale,

You're going to need some experimentation time to find what works best for you. The point of engraving black in something lower than 100% is to prevent large portions of the glass from being zapped. By reducing the black level, you are forcing the engraver to make a halftone, thereby spreading the dots (and therefore the heat) into a wider area. When you hit the sweet spot, the image will look better than if you had run at 100%. Most here would say they run theirs at 70%-90%, but if 50% works for Phyllis then so be it... it will also depend on your substrate, and tempered glass will require a different black level than soda glass for the highest quality engraving.

[Jack Harper]

Another important note as to glass settings, relates to what type of image you are etching. I would say that most of the posts here on the creek are for logos and text. More specifically, most setting referenced are NOT for photos. When you laser a photo you will have to use lower resolution and/or power so as not to overdrive the image.

[Phyllis Williams]

thanks for that explanation Dan,
very well said...i could'nt have said it any better...actually i read about the 50% black and i tried it...and it works real well for me...the etched part is very smooth and no chipping....

[Garrett Nors]

Very informative thread. I never thought to use any other color than black.


I use unused newspaper (we are next to the local newspaper and they give us the rolls of paper that they can't use because there's not enough material to do a full paper run with) soaked for a few seconds in water....does dish soap really help or is it the same effect as water on paper?

[Phyllis Williams]

I've beening doing glass for awhile now and when i first started out i was taught to use wet paper towels and that is just to time consuming when you have a large job...so i started playing and doing reseach and read about the 50% black and that is something that works for me and never had any problems. as for the soap i find that is just to messy :cool:

[Tim Bateson]

I prefer Dish Soap because I can rarely get all of the wrinkles out of paper & that can ruin a job real fast. The other problem I've had with paper is it moving on the rotary rollers - which can also lead to wrinkles and tearing of the paper.
Dish Soap is a no-brain (for me) :rolleyes:
Wipe it on - Engrave - Wash - Done.

[Bill Cunningham]

The TV show called 'Time Warp' (they use ultra high speed photography to see things that would otherwise not be seen) did a experiment using tempered glass. If you strike it of course, it will go into a million pieces. But... if you protect the edges so it gets little expansion room to shatter, it will shatter, but stay completely together.. They took a piece about 2' x 4' and ran a band of Duct Tape (the handyman's secret weapon) around the outside edge, folding it over the glass. This keeps the edges from expanding. They then took a center punch and dinged a edge through the duct tape. the glass shattered into a million pieces that ALL stayed together. They then used this shattered mosaic as the glass top of a coffee table. As long as the tape stays on, the glass will stay together, and stay solid.. Not really laser related, but a unexpected side effect of tempered glass .. It wouldn't surprise me if this experiment has already been posted on youtube..

[Dan Hintz]

That explains why, when an old friend (accidentally) shot his parents' sliding glass door with a BB gun, the glass didn't explode out of the casing. It did continue to crackle into smaller and smaller pieces throughout the rest of the night, though (or so I understand). After it happened we kept hearing this <crinkle crinkle> sound, but it took us an hour to finally realize what had happened and what we were hearing.

Interesting...

[Bill Cunningham]

Yup.. and if they didn't punch it out, that unique decorative bb created door probably held together for years..

"Daisy... Keeping kids off your lawn for over a hundred years" :D

[Jack Harper]

The TV show called 'Time Warp' ...

Speaking of that show, if you watch the intro you will see them pouring all sorts of things through a cut out of the TIME WARD text along with the words exploding from cast explosives. We did all the mold and template cutting for that project. Kind of neat to see your work on TV.

[Bill Cunningham]

Ya! It's cool when you see work you've done on display someplace.. So far, I've had stuff on the T.V. show "Rich Bride Poor Bride", and one of my engraving jobs is in the Carillon of the Washington National Cathedral.. and believe me, THAT was a complete surprise..