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Melissa BurnerMN
05-29-2018, 11:32 AM
I need to engrave an oval piece of marble but I am having issues with it being centered correctly. I'm getting frustrated and running out of blanks. Any one have any tips or tricks for engraving ovals?

Patrick Gardner
05-29-2018, 12:04 PM
-Tape a piece of posterboard onto your honeycomb table.
-Cut out the oval shape.
- Use the cut out area to align your marble
- Engrave

Trey Tull
05-29-2018, 1:42 PM
-Tape a piece of posterboard onto your honeycomb table.
-Cut out the oval shape.
- Use the cut out area to align your marble
- Engrave

Ding Ding Ding....

That is how I would do it as well.

Kev Williams
05-29-2018, 2:18 PM
I keep pieces of old priority mail boxes handy, the cardboard is stiff, but thin. Works great for dog tags and other funny shaped stuff. I'll sometimes get dozens of watchbacks to engrave, in different sizes, sometimes whole watches- I'll measure the back, or the face, cut the correct holes in the cardboard-- then all the setups are done within the same hole(s). As long as the job is aligned in the circle, it'll be aligned on the watch. For 20 of the same watch, cut 20 holes, run 20 watches in one job :)

Melissa BurnerMN
05-29-2018, 2:26 PM
I used a regular piece of cardboard. But it is still off. It went a little low.

Thanks

Bert Kemp
05-29-2018, 2:27 PM
This is how I do it also, except I find tape doesn't hold well on the honeycomb table , BUT rare earth magnets hold the cardboard down very nicely and don't move when you take out your pieces and put in more:)


-Tape a piece of posterboard onto your honeycomb table.
-Cut out the oval shape.
- Use the cut out area to align your marble
- Engrave

Glen Monaghan
05-31-2018, 11:12 PM
Alternatively, you can place the stone at the intended coordinate, covered with blue painter tape or transfer tape, and then run an outline at low enough power to bleach the tape so you can check alignment (or just run the actual job at low power to see exactly where all the engraving will go). If satisfied, carefully remove tape without moving the substrate and engrave normally or, if you want the masking to help with color fill (not necessary for polished marble, but useful for some other substrates), burn right through the tape.

If you have any concern or reason to care about where the engraving goes vs figure in the substrate (I've done some highly figured wood where I wanted the engraving to miss areas of particularly interesting/wild grain), the tape isn't so good because it obscures the substrate surface. In such cases, you can lay a piece of 1/8 inch clear acrylic on top of the substrate and engrave that, which lets you look down through the acrylic to check your alignment without affecting the substrate; when satisfied, remove the acrylic and engrave normally.