Vectoring Formica

[Abdul Baseer Hai]

Hi All
(Rodney, if you are there, please help)
I have a client who wants a design inlaid into a 20 x 20 inch half inch thick wooden base. The design is color coded with the following colors:
Black--Red--Green--Blue--Light tan--Dark Tan. As I find it difficult to locate wood in these colors, the client is suggesting that we go with Formica. I have tried lasering Formica but could not avoid charring damage to the edges.
The base will be either walnut or Wenge wood.
I have a 50 watt GCC Explorer.

Would appreciate detailed, step by step help on the following:
Vectoring Formica and the adhesive to use.
detailed pros and cons of this process.
After the inlays have been glued, how to sand to a smooth finish
Does the depth of the groove has to be more or less than the thickness of the formica


Is there a special formica that should be used for this

If I can get this right, the project quantity will be at least a few hundred.
Urgently awaiting any and all help
Abdul

[Joe Pelonio]

Look at the Rowmark catalog, if you have one, or their website. They might have something that will work, made for laser in the right colors.

I have cut formica, wilsonart and a couple of other high pressure laminates with my 45 watt. They require 2-3 passes at faster speed/lower power to achieve a clean cut. You can also apply transfer tape and mist it with water prior to cutting to reduce charring and crank up the air assist.

For this application your depth in the wood would have to be perfect, you cannot sand the formica without messing it up. As for colored wood, there are places like Rockler that have wood in natural colors that could match but they would be expensive and might require some additional work to achieve uniform thickness. You might think about using one wood for all of it and just cut it into pices and stain them the colors you want. Someone correct me if I'm wrong but I think that a fabric dye would soak in deep enough to allow for some sanding after without taking off the color like would happen with paint.

[Rob Bosworth]

I have cut some formica veneers with fairly good results. I have used trasfer tape as a cover sheet. I have used Johnson Paste Wax for a protective coating on the top surface of the formica sheet. Your 50 watt machine is not going to fly cutting formica, but it should do a pretty good job. If you have a 1.5" fl. lens, you might be able to run it a little faster, and have a smaller kerf to the cut. If you end up with too large of a seperation between the "mother" material and the inlay itself, you might have to do a little scaling on one of the two pieces.

If you customer is looking to use Black--Red--Green--Blue--Light tan--Dark Tan, does he want each one to be identical? If not, I would cut a full pattern out of each color, then mix and match the colors as you go. Very little waste.

[Richard Rumancik]

I have vector cut kitchen-counter style Formica and based on my experience can't recommend trying to inlay it. Maybe there is something out there that cuts better. But you can't sand down the surface. I don't think you will obtain precision edges with all the charring and wide kerf. Also flatness in not always great.

I have not done any inlay but suggest you search on what guitar makers do. You might get some leads.

Have you considered aniline dyes on wood? (Lee Valley in Canada.) I don't know if the penetration is complete enough to fully color the first 10 or 20 thousandths to allow you to sand flush and retain the color. You would need to investigate - maybe you would need a few applications. Aniline dyes are not really bright colors so it depends on what you need.

Check also if UV stability is an issue.

You will need to do some research and testing before deciding.

You didn't say if the inlay shapes are large or small. If they are just small patches you might consider a colored epoxy. Again, they use various inlay techniques like this to decorate guitars.

[Mike Null]

I have done some inlay using IPI or Rowmark laserables of 1/16" and reversed them so the core color would show. That permits sanding and polishing once the inlay is assembled.

[Rodne Gold]

I would route the wood to a little deeper than the thickness of the formica , and not laser it as you wont get a good surface with a laser , the other alternative is to frame the base piece with "sides" slightly thicker than the base so the formica is slightly sunken atop the base piece
We use wilson art or max on top formica , but they all more or less the same. I cut with 30w explorers so a 50w shouldnt be a problem. Ideally you would want to use a 1.5" lens for this , but a 2" should do fine. We use paper application tape on top of the formica and cut it from the backside , often just washing the edge with soapy water removes any char. We use benziene to clean the pieces if the charring is excessive.

Adhesives used are standard Contact types.

As Joe says , using a LOT of air assist helps a ton with charring , we have huge compressors that feed our air and can get a lot of pressure at the nozzles. We also dont use a cutting table as we find they are not flat anyway , preferring to tape the formica to a sacrifical layer of either anodised aluminium or perspex.
The big problems with formicas on our side is that they do not lay flat and often "pop" when cutting. They are however very cheap substrates.
Another option you could go for is to use something like 1.5mm ultra high impact acrylic and spray it the colour you want and cut from behind , this will give you a colour protected by the UHI , but price per sq meter and durability and effect are not the same as a formica.
We also engrave and paint fill formica's.

[Abdul Baseer Hai]

Thank you all for the advice and input.

I guess the consensus is that formica is not a viable option.

I like the same type of wood, colored with aniline dyes idea. will check with Lee Valley and let you know.

The suggestion regarding reversed rowmark is very interesting. This surely will almost resolve the color problem. I will try setting the inlay deeper than the surrounding wood. This way I will require minimal sanding of the plastic surface. How will I get a really smooth finish on the plastic when it is sanded??. do I need to use some sort of a filler to smooth fill the kerf gaps and do I clearcoat the project?. If yes then what should I use?

What adhesive should I use to bond plastic to wood?

More input will be appreciated

Abdul

[Joe Pelonio]

Think of the Rowmark plastic as similar to Bondo used in the auto body repair undustry. You can try wet sanding with 400, 100, and 2000 grit wet/dry, then polish further with automotive rubbing compound. Or, you can go to a plastic supplier like Tap and get their polishing kit, which also has progressively finer compounds for rubbing smooth.

http://www.tapplastics.com/shop/product.php?pid=113&

[Mike Null]

I agree with Joe on the polishing. As for adhesive, contact cement if it's a large area or for smaller areas I use WeldBond.

[Pete Andrew]

Of course your client might consider getting their design made by Formica! I have no idea what the costs involved are, but I gather you can get whatever image/s you like printed up and combined into a sheet of formica, to do with what you like - there should be no reason why the 8 x 4 feet sheet of formica couldn't be of lots the designs, which could each be cut out and glued to whatever thickness of base is required.
Probably not what you wanted to hear but I promise I won't tell your clients!