Need some help please.

[Bryan Oates]

This is an item I am working on for a non profit organization, U.S. Military Veterans With Parkinsons. These guys deal with Agent Orange issues and the pill bottle represents the agent orange barrels from Vietnam. It is a cylinder about 3/4 of an inch in diameter and needs a stripe and some writing printed on it. The material is anodized aluminum. The stripe needs to go all the way around. I anodize these in the green color and then laser the writing and stripe, then anodized the orange color. The problem is that the orange isn't vibrant enough. Hoping someone here may have some advice as how to make this a brighter orange. Would screen printing this work? I could anodize the green then send to a screen printer. I have called around but couldn't find a shop who does printing like this. Does anyone here know of anyone or other ways I may resolve this? Thanks in advance.

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[Gary Hair]

How about applying vinyl? It would be pretty quick, cheap and easy. Screen printing would be next best, but the cost would probably be prohibitive.

Gary

[Bryan Oates]

I have a quantity of these and vinyl might not be durable enough for the rigors of sliding in and out of a pocket or hanging on a key chain. One of the reasons I was trying to laser engrave and re-anodize. I was thinking something like they print coffee mugs with because that stuff seems really durable.

[Dee Gallo]

I know very little about anodizing procedures. Is there such a thing as masking before anodizing?

I had some luck with aluminum using red primer (which looks orange when lasered) covered with auto paint. So if you sprayed them with primer, then green paint, the laser would expose the primer which is not affected by the laser for some reason.

Attached is a small detail to show you what I am talking about.

cheers, dee

[Bryan Oates]

I don't know if this would be an option as my customer has specified the container be anodized OD Green. But this procedure is very interesting to me. Thanks Dee

[Joe Hillmann]

I am thinking that screen printing might be the way to go on this (depending on how many the customer wants) With a circular press those can be printed in about 5 seconds each so you can probably sub it out cheaper than you could do it your self.

[Bryan Oates]

I have been searching for someone with thse capabilities with no success Joe. Would you know a company who provides this service?

[Joe Hillmann]

I do not, I saw one at a DAC show this summer and saw it running and was amazed at how quick it can be done but I think that that type of equipment is most often owned by large factories that don't do work for hire. How many of those bottles do they need? A manual machine looks easy enough to build yourself if you have time to fiddle with it.

[Martin Boekers]

Where are you getting the containers? Is it an ASI Dist? If so they can mark it for you. Can you mask the piece, vector cut and paint?

If you can come up with a method for the stripe a pad printer might work. Ton's of folks doing that. I still would try some sort of decal vinyl
some is pretty darn durable.

[Bryan Oates]

I machine these myself and did the anodizing myself. I am thinking of the vinyl. I might try this. I would really like to do the process of anodizing the orange though. The problem is, anodizing is only as vibrant as the polish of the raw aluminum. When I laser this area becomes dull which makes the color come out dull. Is there a way to keep the aluminum bright while lasering?

I have tried the mask and paint process and didn't like the results.

I wonder if I used a pad printer if I could put it on a rotary fixture and do several presses around on the stripe.

[Joe Hillmann]

Is it possible to do the orange first, engrave and do the green second? That way when you do the orange it is on a polished surface? It will add about 50% longer to your engraving time though.


Also have you discussed price with your customer? It seems like this is going to be a pretty expensive item if you are doing everything in house. Just want to make sure that they aren't expecting to pay $1 each and you are thinking more of $10 each (I have had that happen before and now I make the price known up front)

[Bryan Oates]

Joe, That's an interesting idea. I haven't thought about doing the orange firt. I think I will try that.

These were quoted before I started. I am well within my budget. I knew there would be issues with doing a double anodize. The machining is cheap and easy.

[Dan Hintz]

I'm with Joe... polish, anodize orange (but don't seal/boil), apply mask (a liquid mask might work better here), laser via vector cuts, weed, reanodize with the green (mixing with the orange won't likely be an issue, but it may effect your initial dye color), de-mask, then seal/boil.

[Bryan Oates]

Thanks for all the help everyone. I will try these suggestions next week . I think anodizing th orange first is the way to go.

Dan, why do you say laser via vector instead of raster. Will there be a difference in the outcome? Also, what is "weed"?

Thanks again.

[Joe Hillmann]

Bryan,

Not trying to get this thread off topic but what do you do with the acid once you are done anodizing something?

[Dan Hintz]

For a relatively simple design, vectoring may be faster than rastering... you'll have to make a judgement call and/or test each way. Weeding is removing the unwanted portions of the mask, i.e., the stuff you want to anodize green. If you raster engrave away the mask, weeding is unnecessary.

[Bryan Oates]

Bryan,

Not trying to get this thread off topic but what do you do with the acid once you are done anodizing something?

I don't anodize very often and the acid can be used hundreds of times. I haven't had to dispose of any yet. I guess I will have to face that beast when the time comes.

[Bryan Oates]

For a relatively simple design, vectoring may be faster than rastering... you'll have to make a judgement call and/or test each way. Weeding is removing the unwanted portions of the mask, i.e., the stuff you want to anodize green. If you raster engrave away the mask, weeding is unnecessary.

I understand. Just didn't know it was called weeding.:)