Newbie in town with a chinese laser engrave machine

[bianca hoogendoorn]

Hi all

i,m bianca from holland, and my english is very bad
but i hope you will understand me, and forgive me the mistakes with writing.

Just buy a laser machine, realy like it, i,m realy new in engraving and cutting with a lasermachine.
i,m not a newbie in glass, i fuse pendants and did torch beads for 6 years, stop making beads not my thing anymore.
but want to stay in the glass etc.
so my first engrave machine, i love the glass engraving because thats works well for me.
have alot to learn but for a beginner it is not bad.

now i want to learn how to cut stuff with acrylic
and how to engrave acrylic,because it can melt, or you get a relief not a engrave piece.
want to make a christmas ball with a picture of my dog on it.
So thats my new project for now,

i have a chinese laser 40 watt desktop model.
like 18 x 25 cm. not much
but will save for a larger one in futere, only one thing i have a driver of morshi draw, i hate that program, cant control speed etc

i have a line of outline carve normal, can click outline only for cutting. and a few more but not much
have alot to learn working with coreldraw, i,m a cs5 worker , doing also hobby potrait photography.
so i know how cs5 works, but corel is more technical, not that smart but will learn alot.

Want to say hello to this forum, have alot to read
and hope i will learn how to engrave acrylics,

with love bianca (biebs) i say alot biebs everybody calls me biebs.

[Dan Hintz]

Welcome to The Creek, Biebs...

[bianca hoogendoorn]

thank you dan, i see i have alot to read
but i like to learn and read, so doing my days here, :)

[Rodne Gold]

Welcome.
Ek praat afrikaans , amper dieselfde as Hollands.
*I speak afrikaans , almost the same as dutch*
You have to "invert" the picture to engrave on acrylic , you can do this in the software you prepare the picture in before importing it into the laser program , you will also have to mirror it if you engrave from the back , also done in the program you use before Moshi. I dont know moshidraw , but people genrally dont like it ....

[bianca hoogendoorn]

ja dat is bijna hetzelfde als nederlands,
thank you for explaining, i do my pictures on a easy lazy manor, the 1 touch laser photo
but my 30 days trial is over, and to expensive to buy for me, so have to learn to convert it to glass tiles and acryl with coreldraw.
i do mirrow it with glas and acrylic engraving, i hate the moshidraw, but cant use anything else it is the driver of my machine.
maby if i win the lotery someday, i will buy a great machine with better software,LOL

but have to learn engrave on acrylic because now he make relief instead of engrave, i think have to put the machine down
so he will engrave and not melt it in a relief.

[Dan Hintz]

Ah, now I think I understand what you're asking... how to prevent the laser from melting the acrylic, when what you really want is to simply engrave a picture on it.

First, make sure you're not overpowering your substrate (acrylic)... run a series of tests to determine what's the lowest power you can use that still marks the acrylic. Once you have that, run more tests to determine the highest resolution you can get without making the picture fuzzy/blurry... this is probably going to be somewhere around 300-500 dpi, but you'll have to experiment to find your own personal sweet spot. This will give you a good starting point to work from.

[bianca hoogendoorn]

Thank you dan for the tips, will do that
sorry for my bad english.
technical english is so hard for me, but trying to you all understand my learning proces. :)

[Rich Harman]

Make sure that you are using cast acrylic for engraving.

Extruded acrylic does not work as well and will appear melted.

[Dan Hintz]

Make sure that you are using cast acrylic for engraving.

Extruded acrylic does not work as well and will appear melted.
Ah, I should have added that... good advice. You spend so much time doing it, you forget what people don't know in the beginning.

[bianca hoogendoorn]

thank you for the advise will do that, will ask supliers what it is