Sean Sarmast
06-06-2006, 2:01 PM
Hello All,
I'm a fairly infrequent poster to this site but a voracious reader. The expertise on this site has helped me in my more traditional woodworking hobby many times.
My question relates to laser marquetry, but likely more towards the assembly of marquetry image (that happened to be cut with a laser, a Epilog Mini 18).
On pieces with a small number of parts I've had great success. I use the Corel contour tool cut out a piece and it's negative (say a circle and a larger piece with hole cut into it). I cut the piece upside down in the laser for kerf management. Then, I'll lay out a bunch of blue tape and assemble the pieces with upside on the tape. Using contact cement I can get just about invisible cut lines.
Naturally, if it worked on small 2,3 or 4 piece image it should work on 100 piece images right? Crawl then run a marathon. Well, my assembly method gets a little iffy when I have to assemble larger or larger in number images.
I have problems keeping the bottom/top/middle (depending on how I start to assemble) lined up. I'll have narrow/invisible kerfs on one part of the image and large gaping holes (maybe 0.010" or larger) between pieces in another part.
I had an idea a while back to try PVA glue for assembly as it has the tendency to expand the wood and therefore might hide the misalignments. I've been unable to develop an assembly method using such glue that keeps the pieces from shifting. My tape method just leaves lots of room for the glue to sneak up and adhere to the tape and I don't have enough open time to assemble while wet.
The books I've read on traditional marquetry (I've never done it) seem to focus on the double-bevel method which I'm not sure applies to cutting out the pieces like a puzzle.
Would anyone mind sharing their techniques? I've seen some beautiful images that have been attributed to laser marquetry so I know it's possible with the right skills.
Thanks to all for the knowledge already contained on this site.
I'm a fairly infrequent poster to this site but a voracious reader. The expertise on this site has helped me in my more traditional woodworking hobby many times.
My question relates to laser marquetry, but likely more towards the assembly of marquetry image (that happened to be cut with a laser, a Epilog Mini 18).
On pieces with a small number of parts I've had great success. I use the Corel contour tool cut out a piece and it's negative (say a circle and a larger piece with hole cut into it). I cut the piece upside down in the laser for kerf management. Then, I'll lay out a bunch of blue tape and assemble the pieces with upside on the tape. Using contact cement I can get just about invisible cut lines.
Naturally, if it worked on small 2,3 or 4 piece image it should work on 100 piece images right? Crawl then run a marathon. Well, my assembly method gets a little iffy when I have to assemble larger or larger in number images.
I have problems keeping the bottom/top/middle (depending on how I start to assemble) lined up. I'll have narrow/invisible kerfs on one part of the image and large gaping holes (maybe 0.010" or larger) between pieces in another part.
I had an idea a while back to try PVA glue for assembly as it has the tendency to expand the wood and therefore might hide the misalignments. I've been unable to develop an assembly method using such glue that keeps the pieces from shifting. My tape method just leaves lots of room for the glue to sneak up and adhere to the tape and I don't have enough open time to assemble while wet.
The books I've read on traditional marquetry (I've never done it) seem to focus on the double-bevel method which I'm not sure applies to cutting out the pieces like a puzzle.
Would anyone mind sharing their techniques? I've seen some beautiful images that have been attributed to laser marquetry so I know it's possible with the right skills.
Thanks to all for the knowledge already contained on this site.