Engraving Painted MDF

[Julian Ashcroft]

One of the things I want to do with my new laser Engraver, is to engrave designs for clocks. I have done a few on my Roland EGX-300, but it is slow and the cutters are worn down pretty quickly. I did a test run last night on some MDF, design was vector and it came out fine. I may go for a slightly softer focus so I get a slightly wider mark on the MDF.

MDF as it is is a bit boring to look at and so I would like to engrave into an already painted finish. Was in the local DIY store yesterday and picked up a couple of cans of spray paint, one was a pretty normal cream matt paint, but the other produced a stone like textured finish, which looked really good. Haven't tried them under the laser, yet, as I don't know if it's safe to do so.

Is it normal practice to laser engrave onto painted finishes or am I going down the wrong path here?

The clock below is actually a piece of plastic veneered MDF, done on my Roland Engraver, that's the sort of design I will be doing on the painted MDF on the laser hopefully.

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[Mike Null]

Julian

Do whatever strikes your fancy. I imagine all of us have done some engraving through painted surfaces of varying types. Experimentation may reveal a look that is even better than you expected. Go for it!

I've had very nice results using acrylic painted on the back and reverse engraved then color filled.

[Dave Sheldrake]

Pretty safe on most paints Ju, try laminate flooring as well, that can be fun :)

cheers

Dave

[Dee Gallo]

As long as you get a nice even coating, you'll be fine. I've also seen a "vintage" look using black as a base, then white on top. After laser engraving, they used sandpaper to wear away the white around the edges and gave it a worn/cottage feel. You can also mask areas and get a lot of different colors going at once.

[Andrew Holloway]

You can also cover with transfer tape/masking tape, engrave the tape and paint off and before removing the tape paint the engraved sections with a different colour.