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Roger Lueck
09-30-2013, 6:06 PM
I've been reading several sites regarding materials that are safe to laser engrave/cut, precuations that must be taken when engraving/cutting some materials and then those materials that you do not touch with a laser engraver.

Is there a comprehensive list of materials that has been compiled on a website that provides information regarding the physical, mechanical and chemical characteristics of those materials relative to laser engraving/cutting?

Dan Hintz
09-30-2013, 7:07 PM
I've been reading several sites regarding materials that are safe to laser engrave/cut, precuations that must be taken when engraving/cutting some materials and then those materials that you do not touch with a laser engraver.

Is there a comprehensive list of materials that has been compiled on a website that provides information regarding the physical, mechanical and chemical characteristics of those materials relative to laser engraving/cutting?

No... at least not that I'm aware of. SMC is probably your biggest library, but it's scattered throughout thousands of threads. PVC is the biggest no-no, but any chloride is a bad thing to laser.

Dave Sheldrake
09-30-2013, 8:09 PM
Synrads list of plastics

http://www.synrad.com/synradinside/pdfs/LaserProcessingGuide_Plastics.pdf

cheers

Dave

Guy Hilliard
09-30-2013, 9:20 PM
PVC / vinyl - no no (chemical hazard)
Any Polyethylene (LDPE, PE, HDPE, UHMW) - doesn't laser cut or engrave worth a damn, just melts.
ABS - stinks bad, some edge melt back, may distort when engraved
Styrene - some edge melt back, may distort when engraved
Polycarbonate (Lexan, Marlon, etc) - Thin films cut well (up to 0.040 - 0.060"). Thicker material not so well. Stinks, yellow dust.

Mylar - good
Acrylic - great, extruded cuts with better edge finish but engraves with no contrast, cast engraves with good / great contrast, impact modified acrylic stinks bad
Paper - good, depends on the finish on the paper
Wood - good, dry resin less woods cut better / easier / less smoke damage
MDF hardboard - good in thin sheets (<= 1/4")
Plywood - good / varies depending on quality and adhesive, Baltic Birch plywood and Liteply (good quality poplar plywood) work well

Other materials, suck it and see. You may like it.

Doug Griffith
09-30-2013, 10:51 PM
It should be a sticky in this forum. Makes sense to me.

Gary Hair
10-01-2013, 12:16 AM
PVC, or anything with PVC in it, and Teflon - the only two things you just can't (or shouldn't) laser. Other than that it comes down to how well it works, some things are better than others and I'd suggest you try them yourself. The first six months I had my laser EVERYTHING was "potentially laserable" and my wife had a very tight grip on the dog...

Pat Matranga
10-02-2013, 1:36 AM
Hi, I am new to this forum. I'm trying to decide between getting a 50 watt Universal or 50 watt Epilog. Looks like most have Epilogs. I'll be engraving my woodwork. Also vector cutting out pieces some. Thank you, Pat.

Johan de Waal
10-02-2013, 1:44 AM
+1
I searched hi and low to get this sort of info with little success. This is helping a lot



It should be a sticky in this forum. Makes sense to me.

Mike Null
10-02-2013, 6:18 AM
I believe each of the laser manufacturers has such a list in their owner's guide. (at least ULS, Epilog and Trotec do)

here are some ideas http://www.epiloglaser.com/laser-knowledge-base.htm

Dennis Watson
10-02-2013, 9:04 AM
And marble, stone, leather, glass and some foods are ok for lasers.

Joe Hillmann
10-02-2013, 10:01 AM
This has been posted before but it is good information so here it is again.

Here is a way to test for plastics that you shouldn't engrave on

http://vimeo.com/1615418

The wire you use HAS to be copper, and here is the explanation behind it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beilstein_test

gary l roberts
10-02-2013, 10:28 AM
Thanks for the data everybody.

Mark Ross
10-04-2013, 7:03 PM
Pat, most don't have Epilogs it is pretty wide spread with different businesses having different levels of acceptable pain. We have two Epilog 36 EXT's and the Engineers have to wait until the factory is done finishing orders before being allowed to "play" (cut test equipment, align the lasers and so on). We can't afford to have our lasers down. We had one, got enough business for a second, and can't quite yet justify a third. Epilog is second to none in the equipment I have to watch over. Great bunch of people to work with. However...oh we pay...probably 3 times what you can get a rabbit for. However, try shutting down a customer's line. If you are doing onsie twosies, or you run the same pattern 5 days a week, there is a reason some people have Epilogs and some people have Rabbits. In the end they all do the same thing. My machine is air cooled, built like a brick chicken coop, I have called Epilog at midnight on one of their tech's cell phones. Rabbit is getting better building their business as well. I just can wait for them to build it, I can't handle worrying about liquid cooled versus air cooled and so on. Think of it like buying a Caterpillar to push dirt around a farm, or buying one to vertically mine for gold. If you can stand a painful learning curve for both up and running and technical support, buy Rabbit. If you need to send a picture to Epilog and say, this is what my machine is doing send every part that could cause it UPS Red and let me return what I don't use, buy Epilog. I can't talk about Universal, basically we have people trained on 36 EXT's and if we got in a great job that was really small in size but large in volume, we would add 36EXT's because that is what our people know.