Extractions and Cutting Table?

[Jiten Patel]

Hey Folks.

I should be buying my laser next week and just setting up plans on extraction and the cutting table I will use. Im a little confused as to whats the best method for both.

I will be mainly cutting intricate designs into card/paper with a 30W CO2 Galvo.

Extraction - Whats the cheapest most effective way to do this to get the smoke away from the card/paper quickly and effectively? I have been advised to place whatever extraction I get underneath the card so it sucks away the smoke from underneath? Any truth in this?

Table - What would be ideal for card card/paper? Honeycomb? Any other ideas?

Also any ideas on creating a jig to have an adjustable X and Y stop so I can butt up card to it for repeat jobs? It needs to be adjustable as our card sizes vary but also need to be pretty acurate....?

Thanks in advance

Jit

[Dan Hintz]

Extraction under the substrate helps hold unruly substrates to the table, but you still need some flowing over the substrate to get rid of smoke.

[Doug Griffith]

Also any ideas on creating a jig to have an adjustable X and Y stop so I can butt up card to it for repeat jobs? It needs to be adjustable as our card sizes vary but also need to be pretty acurate....?

How about positioning the art for the largest sized card (which requires the art center point to be furthest from x0,y0). Then use interchangeable corner fixtures labeled for each card size. The fixture is placed in the up-left corner of the laser. Then the card is placed in the up-left corner of the fixture.

[paul mott]

Hi Jit,

Inspired by another thread here I made my own cutting table from metal venetian blind slats, formed and mounted on their sides.
I must be related to Mr Scrooge somewhere in my past and anything which saved the cost of buying that honeycomb had to be worth trying. :)

Paul.

http://www.cooperman.talktalk.net/files/27_files/image734.jpg

[Viktor Voroncov]

I saw a lot of tables made from metal venetian blind slats but it's worst construction you can do :(
Much better is here
HERE WAS LINK TO HUGE AMOUNT OF INFORMATION :) DELETED, so i put three pictures instead

No problems even with paper cutting.

[paul mott]

Tut. Tut. Tut. Viktor - you are advertising again :D:D

Paul.

[Viktor Voroncov]

I can delete link and put here just pictures, but on our site information is full and easy to understand. Don't hope that SMC members will send me 100 orders today :)

And be honest Paul - my table is better, than your :) :) :)

[Joe De Medeiros]

I needed a quick and dirty pin table one day, so I used a piece of 1/2 plywood, and then used my brad nailer with 2" brads, it worked quite good, and did I mention that it was cheap.

[Ross Moshinsky]

We made a pin table last week. 3/8" Acrylic scrap with 1/8" holes every 1/2" done by our endmill bit on our rotary engraver. You could mark the holes with the laser and then just drill with a drill press and an acrylic bit (McMaster PN 27465A81). Then we ordered 1/8"x1.5" pins (McMaster PN 98381A478) and it works pretty great. Total cost was probably around $20 for 100 pins & new drill bit. Acrylic scrap was "free".

I do have to work out a basic fence still because when I turn on the exhaust the material sometimes starts to float and wonder.

[Mike Null]

You need air flow above and below the table in order to remove the hot smoky residue that can mark, or at best, dirty the finish of your product.

[Viktor Voroncov]

Acrylic could be waved under high temperature, sometimes acrylic can provide open fire. What you offer here - is cheap temporary solution, but in many cases it's ok.

[Dan Hintz]

Viktor,

Pin tables don't work very well with paper... you can't turn on a vacuum system to hold the paper down to the pins or exhaust smoke residue. For acrylic, though, it works quite well...

[Ross Moshinsky]

Viktor,

Pin tables don't work very well with paper... you can't turn on a vacuum system to hold the paper down to the pins or exhaust smoke residue. For acrylic, though, it works quite well...

Do you have a way to cut paper with the exhaust on? My only method has been to lay it directly on the table and wait until the engraving/cutting is done and then turn on the exhaust fan. If I can get away with it, I'll tape the paper down and pulse the exhaust to clear out some of the smoke.

[Greg Bednar]

Do you have a way to cut paper with the exhaust on?
I like to use Sticky Tack sometimes, depending on paper weight.

[Chuck Stone]

If I'm not lasering all over the paper, I weight it down with 3/16" strips of
brass of lead. (just happened to have them laying around) where the laser
isn't going to go. That seems to stop it from floating away.

[Rodne Gold]

I assume that you want to do lots of these in little time , so anything that is fiddly etc is not going to work well

Your biggest problem with the card cutting you do is going to be clearing the table of the cut card and the pieces that fall out. The pieces that fall out are going to be an issue as they will get everywhere and take appreciable time to remove.

What you need is a shuttle system - and you dont need a honeycomb table at all for what you want to do - you can lay the card flat on a piece of anodised aluminium or on another piece of thickish cardboard/ply/whatever
You can cut many of these jigs or templates and preload the card and just swap em with the newly cut card.

You could also try cutting 2 cards at a time not just one , tho you might get a lot more edge colouration - a piece of tissue paper between the 2 might work better.

Your exhaust system also wont be too critical as it really only needs to remove a little smoke - a strategically placed shop vac might do - prolly have high noise levels tho.

[Viktor Voroncov]

Dan, there is special addition to our table which allowed you cut paper with air assist with no problems.

[Dan Hintz]

Ross,

For paper, the vector table is really the easiest method... plenty of vacuum under the table to keep it straight, and allows some vacuum over the table for smoke removal. If you have a lot of fiddly stuff, like Rodney mentioned, remove the items you want form the table and use a shop vac to quickly go over the table... removes all of the detritus in just a few seconds, then reload.

Of you could do like James and install a 5HP collector which will more than likely suck any detritus straight through the table ;)

[paul mott]

Viktor,

I still can't decide if your table is better than mine or not. Could you please send me a free sample so I can compare the two then I will report back on which is the better of the two ?. :D

Paul.

[Viktor Voroncov]

What is model of your laser?

[Jiten Patel]

Thank you all.

Our laser system comes with a honeycomb table or equivalent. I just wanted to know whether this is the best for it.

The idea for creating seperate jigs for different sized cards sounds like a good plan although this would render the honeycomb useless. I thought of having something attached to the honeycomb (or whatever we go with) that is adjustable - some like the system on the pic....obviously they are both on the x axis, but possibly could be modified for the x and y.

A shuttle system would be ideal, but we got advised that as some of our designs are pretty complex, taking around 3 mins with the galvo, a shuttle system would be pointless.

We tried stacking, but the smoke damage was unacceptable. One at a time seems to be the only way.

Would a dust collector with the pipes leading outside work well for smoke? As I will be operating the laser for lenghthy periods, ideally i would like it to be as quiet a possible.

[Jiten Patel]

Pic of what we are trying to achieve.

[Jiten Patel]

Pic of the Jig system. The red handle are turned to adjust the wooden slats.

[Dan Hintz]

Beautiful card, though I'm surprised it still takes 3 min/card... I would have expected closer to 20-30 secs. Are you sure the path has been optimized?

EDIT: I see now that it's a tri-fold design... still, I would expect a little better time than 3 minutes... half of that time is closer to what I would expect.

[Doug Griffith]

Build the interchangeable jigs as I mentioned before but add perforated anodized aluminum beneath each one as a self contained shuttle system. This would allow the vacuum to hold the paper down. Build 2 of each. While one is cutting, weed the other.

Or, build only 2 jigs and key the table to register the jigs for each card size.

[Jiten Patel]

Beautiful card, though I'm surprised it still takes 3 min/card... I would have expected closer to 20-30 secs. Are you sure the path has been optimized?

EDIT: I see now that it's a tri-fold design... still, I would expect a little better time than 3 minutes... half of that time is closer to what I would expect.

Dan,

Thanks.

We havent had too much time to play around with the galvo and its settings, but the time we did have produced varied results. We found a few passes at speed reduced charring as opposed to a slower one. If we mark the card rather than cut it, it takes around 15-30 seconds dependant on design, but cutting did take a while. Once we get the Galvo, i will be able to play around with the vectors to get it right. Some full shapes only really need to be lines.

Cant wait to get bad boy though.

Doug, you idea definately works. The only reason why I am hesitant is that as this is wedding stationery, we will be doing 25-500 at a time. The jig would need to be placed perfectly everytime and re-alligned. If we have something in place which the card just butted against, then when it was done, removed and replaced with another one and so on and so forth, I think this would make the time per job a lot quicker?

[Doug Griffith]

we will be doing 25-500 at a time.
Gang them up by putting as many "up-left" corners on the fixture that fit in your machine.


The jig would need to be placed perfectly everytime and re-alligned.
That's not a problem. Build a sub fixture that holds the replaceable fixtures and uses dowel pins or keys you cut on the laser to align. Or just wedge in the up left corner.


If we have something in place which the card just butted against, then when it was done, removed and replaced with another one and so on and so forth, I think this would make the time per job a lot quicker?
I would create 2 fixtures per layout. Cut while you weed.

[Viktor Voroncov]

Just got e-mail from Synrad with link to video of card engraving and cutting - impressive :)
http://www.synrad.com/Applications/video_link.htm