Silver burns... Increase the hatch distance (if using .04 for example, try .05), speed it up by 1000, reduce power by 20%, freq at 30, plan on lots of passes but cleaner engraving, hopefully--
Silver burns... Increase the hatch distance (if using .04 for example, try .05), speed it up by 1000, reduce power by 20%, freq at 30, plan on lots of passes but cleaner engraving, hopefully--
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ELEVEN - rotary cutter tool machines
FOUR - CO2 lasers
THREE- make that FOUR now - fiber lasers
ONE - vinyl cutter
CASmate, Corel, Gravostyle
I ran it at 200 passes at 1000, 200 at 500 half at 80% power and half at 100%, all at 30 freq. and it barely made a white mark on the surface, which wiped right off.
I think my lens is just too big and the power is depleted. I'm hoping to get a 160MM lens soon that will give me a 110 x 110 working area and the lens can be much closer to the material vs the 410 or so MM it needs to be above the materials now with my 300mm x 300mm work area.
So I was thinking of the problems I have with silver. That long lens may indeed be the culprit. With some freq and focus tweaking you may be able to get it to ablate the silver, which can be finicky like copper. My Triumph simply will not engrave copper unless I hit the frequency/speed ratio just right, which is more trouble than it's worth, with an f=210 lens. And yet my 2 ebay machines have NO problem with copper...
speaking of an f=210 lens, I'd suggest one of those as a first upgrade, they give you a 6"-ish square work area, great middle of the road lens...
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ELEVEN - rotary cutter tool machines
FOUR - CO2 lasers
THREE- make that FOUR now - fiber lasers
ONE - vinyl cutter
CASmate, Corel, Gravostyle
Get a smaller lens. I cut silver, (did a lot of gold plated silver jewelry last year and my little 20 Watt cut into the silver quite easily.
(cuts gold like butter, and I can easily get depth to silver with my 150mm lens (110 is standard and usual on 20 W)
I've done solid silver jewelry and it works well with low wattage.
Woodworking, Old Tools and Shooting
Ray Fine RF-1390 Laser Ray Fine 20watt Fiber Laser
SFX 50 Watt Fiber Laser
PM2000, Delta BS, Delta sander, Powermatic 50 jointer,
Powermatic 100-12 planer, Rockwell 15-126 radial drill press
Rockwell 46-450 lathe, and 2 Walker Turner RA1100 radial saws
Jet JWS18, bandsaw Carbide Create CNC, RIA 22TCM 1911s and others
Just picked up a 160mm F-theta lens off Ebay, which if I understand, gets me to a 110 x 110 mm work area, much closer than my current 300 x 300 mm work area, and likely more power?
Can you share your settings you use for your silver? I would assume high power, low Khz, and slow passes?
Success!
Got a new 160mm lens, installed it, and was able to engrave silver!
It wasn't pretty, but it worked.
My old 420mm lens must have been underpowered.
IMG_20200328_161650~2.jpg
IMG_20200326_164949.jpg
Now, to figure out how to setup new lens.
Thats another thread.
Thanks again!
Last edited by Danielle Chavez; 03-29-2020 at 1:51 PM.