Engraving parameters for 30W MOPA on acrylic (plexiglas)

[Marius Nel]

I've been trying to engrave plexiglass using the setting recommend by the machine supplier and also others downloaded from various sites. However I've not been able to replicate the same result that they have shown in testing prior to me purchasing the machine. I only achieve a grey versus white marking on black and no marking/burning on coloured Plexiglas. I've created a few different map/matrix with various power/frequency/q pulse width to test with but either no result or burned plastic as result.

Is there anyone who could suggest a more productive method to test various settings on a substrate or even willing to share settings that they have been using that works on the Plexiglas? Also any suggestions on how to 'replicate' non-mopa settings on a MOPA machine? For example using a fixed Q pulse width to simulate a non-mopa machine? And what would that be?

Thank you

[Scott Shepherd]

I can't offer much help because we aren't running a MOPA system but I can tell you that the acrylic itself matters. Especially the black. Some brands mark super bright white and some brands mark gray. There's nothing that I'm aware of that you can do to make it white on the material that engraves gray. Been there, done that. As for clear acrylic, I've never seen that done and never been able to do it.