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Do you get good results in one pass, or are you needing to run a second pass? And what's your laser power?
I'm trying to price out 500 of the things, and while I've done a lot of powdercoated flasks, I've never done a Polar Camel.
Black seems to be the most forgiving too, provided the coat isn't like coal tar.. ;)
Kev
I have not done Polar Camel but the black Yetis are the easiest of the powder-coated colors. One pass and a rinse with Magic eraser and Zep Fast 505 does the trick.
I use our 30w CO2 @ 44s100p600dpi with good results of fine details (it's a modified REMAX logo fwiw). A quick cleanup with magic eraser dipped in DNA makes it shine right quick.
Sounds good guys, much appreciated! http://www.engraver1.com/gifs/thumbup.gif
Hey Kev! I'm on a 100watt EFR tube and run Polar Camel Black at 400 mm/s, 34% power (probably can get away with 32/33), 0.06/423.33 DPI, 2.5" Lens and can get excellent detail in our State Seal, which is pretty detailed. I also use a magic eraser but I use the HD's ZEP Heavy Duty Citrus Degreaser. Usually I can spray and walk away for a couple minutes and wash the residue off.
I'm running a 100 Watt glass tube in my CamFive here, and run almost identical settings to Jeff, except I run most stuff about 300 dpi with a 2" lens. Clean up with a Magic Eraser and LA's Awesome spray. I will caution you though, I got a couple of cases of black Polar Camel's recently that had thicker coating on them that were an absolute pain. I had to run about 80 watts and scrub them like crazy with a Magic Eraser to get everything off. The ended up looking nice in the end, but where a lot of work. That's the only issue I've ever had though.
I have never done Polar, but I am the Production Supervisor of Tempercraft. You can and probably will come into issues with thicker paint. When this happens I just do a 2nd pass. We use Jacks Manufacturing wipes as there is no need to rinse afterwards. Just wipe dry with a clean rag.
This particular job, I was really trying to get away from running a second pass. It was a large double sided design that took about 8 minutes per mug, and I had about 100 of them to do. Really didn't want to double that time. It took some elbow grease to get them done, but I could do that while the next mug was engraving, keeping my overall time the same in the end.Quote:
Originally Posted by Paula Curtis
Yeah, I'm not looking to do 500 of anything TWICE ;)
Thanks for the input everyone! -So far this may be for naught, haven't heard back. Not unusual since MY customer is in marketing and HIS customer is who wants 500 of these. When whoever's going to pay for them figures out they're looking at upwards of $15k all in for a promo, minds can start a-changin'... ;)
I am just learning, so I have had to try all kinds of things...and I keep a detailed account of everything I have tried. These are my settings with a BOSS LS-1420, 65 Watt. But Magic Eraser is definitely my friend on these afterwards! They took one pass easily with the right setting. Once I ruined one tumbler, I just tried out everything I could on that to avoid ruining any more.
Powder Coated 100 25 0.07 ok, but dpi of .05 no good Tumbler 100 75 0.065 ok Polar Camel 325 12 0.07 Good for shading? 300 30 0.065 BEST 375 27 0.04 next best 150 50 0.065 poor 200 20 0.085 poor 250 7 0.07 fail 250 40 0.007 275 10 0.065 fail 275 15 0.065 fail 325 20 0.07 fail 325 25 0.065 fail
We've been engraving black Polar Camels for a couple years now and haven't needed to engrave them more than once, until recently! The last ones we did, yesterday, we had to engrave them three times to get them good enough. We didn't make any settings changes either. I'm wondering if something changed in the powder coating?
Yes, something changed, either the powdercoating was laid on much thicker, or a different brand/type/formula/alloftheabove was used. Probably just thicker... I've done many Hydroflasks, quality mug but man is the coating inconsistent! Of course, the user will never know, but the user's engraver sure will! ;)
I ran some in March for a golf tournament (that hasn't happened yet) and they were white. I had some that has at least 1/16" thick coating.... Only ran once, but I hit them all with about 60% of my 80 watts.
Clean up with simple green or other similar cleaner. And BTW, I found that Bar keeper's friend will REALLy shine the base metal up.