Engraving iPads

[Liesl Dexheimer]

I just did a search here on the forum regarding iPad engraving. I see some people have engraved them successfully. Can they be engraved on a 35 watt Epilog without using Cermark? Is the back made of some sort of plastic or metal (it looks shiny from what I can see)?

[Avraham Monina]

Yes, they are anodized (like colorful dog tags), so you can just laser that away, the same with Macbook pro and Macbook Air, after you engrave it you will see this gray color, looks good (I think), if you look at the photo of the Macbook you will see a very dark color circle (bottom right) that was with cermark, I found that I need to laser off the anodized coating and then brush on the cermark.
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[Avraham Monina]

I have seen online people engrave the ipad all the way to the edge with 1 run of the laser, i would love to know how they do it, mine gets out of focus and the curve.

[matthew knott]

they are made from clear-anodised aluminium, they should engrave fine but you wont get much contrast, white engrave on silver.


I just did a search here on the forum regarding iPad engraving. I see some people have engraved them successfully. Can they be engraved on a 35 watt Epilog without using Cermark? Is the back made of some sort of plastic or metal (it looks shiny from what I can see)?

[Mark Ross]

Avraham,

It depends on the software you are using. What we do is near the edge curves our engraving is a different color and the colors determine the power the laser runs at. If your software does not allow that, measure the radius, figure out the center depth, set your software for the center depth, run the flat, then as a separate job, run the edge portions with the table adjusted for the center of the radius.

[Mark Ross]

HAHA....the apple logo, I'd make one up with a worm crawling out and the words "OMG I have a virus..." then again, a worm is a worm and a virus is a virus...maybe draw a nice tree branch holding the apple? Or go to images google dawt com and type in darth vader apple logo?

[Liesl Dexheimer]

Ahh, thank you so much for the replies! I have engraved a Powerbook cover & some iPods before but I was questioning the iPad, good to know that it's anodized aluminum as well. :)