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SHELDON RIER
09-05-2021, 9:55 AM
Looking to make so 6"w x 40" long 6mm clear acrylic panels for edge lighting with LED's
the lighting will be ran along both sides of the 40" length so the light only needs to travel 3" to reach the middle of the panel
typically when you look at these they have a grid lasered on the back to catch the light
any ideas as to how far apart the grid lines should be?
are dots or any other patterns effective too?
any other tips or advice would be appreciated

Thanks!!!

Kev Williams
09-05-2021, 11:57 AM
ANY abrasion to the surface of cast acrylic will light up when edge lit. Imperfections will also stand out, such as 'banding', where (for reasons unknown to me) the laser's path may overlap more in some areas than others, causing light to reflect/refract inconsistently...
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The best way I've found to engrave plex and glass consistently is to engrave everything as a photo, so the laser's output is 'broken up'--

this is a wine glass I engraved 'normally', notice all the wacky banding patterns-
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this is what I got when I painted the logo 80% black in Corel and let the machine
engrave it as a halftone photo--
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Same effects can happen with plex...

Best advice I have besides this is get some scrap pieces of plex and do lots of tests :)