The “finishing” layer definition is very different than the “engraving” layer definition. For my 60W fiber laser and a 175x175mm lens, these are my current parameters:
I just took a coaster and wandered around playing with settings. From the left, the first was me being in a rush and forgetting to focus down after playing with some much taller rocks. Then I was way too strong, turning it into bubbly glass. The next was maybe half that (just playing with speed and power to approximate energy onto the surface). Then getting there, then a bit too weak, and then something close enough to start playing with all the other knobs trying to dial in something that seemed like what I wanted.
The light engraving cut off on the right is more or less what it’d look like untextured (although that was just part of a first pass on the engraving step). The piece on the bottom right was my “I think I’ve got this good enough to make the actual coasters now” test.
Note that for the finishing step, the size of the pattern can make a significant difference. If you do “Fill all shapes at once” on a coaster, there’s plenty of time for it to “cool” between hits. If you have a design with a lot of little leaves (like the test leaves in the arc at the top) and you do “Fill shapes individually” with the same settings, you may end up with bubbly glass instead of a microbead-type texture. It can take a bit of tweaking, but I really like the result.
Thats quite amazing, you can apply so much variation. In the test arch leaves there are some really nice finishes with what might be called colour variation as well as texture.
It will be nice when you have intuitive knowledge that you can apply at thinking design stage and be confident of the outcome…esp when chatting with customers.
So, I painted some black landscaping rocks with “rustic orange” spray paint (Rust-Oleum 334089), then used the fiber laser settings from before to add faces to them. I think they turned out rather nice.
I have lots of white rocks and black rocks neither one engraved very well. That looks really nice. Thanks for posting this.
By the way, red stones, polished blue and black stones engrave very nicely
Would that explain the low resolution in the lettering on the USN rock.
I had thought it might be a combination of font syle and rock type…Blooming from low speed/high power, but out of focus makes sense.
I use a Falcon 2 22 watt laser. It has a rather short focal span length but I suspect it is long enough to cut the edges. It is possible that I didn’t set the adjustment and it just worked out. My wife bought a box of shiny stones of various colors at a yard sale yesterday. I will try to engrave a few and post pictures.
Way cool!
Im looking for a smaller engraver and this Sculpfun iCube Pro Max 10w looks really interessting with how far it can be away from the object. By that price…xmas is around the corner…
I tried to engrave a shiny blue stone this evening. I tried to do it with no spray powder because the nozzle broke. There was no sign that the laser ener touched it. I have a new spray can on order.
I get your point but can any generalisations be made say for sandstone under a given power/speed for diode, Co2, Fiber, or are there many subtypes of each rock type…as in color, particle size and particle type mixture.
A particular liking for list making would be handy…I’m sure Charles Darwin would have faced the same problem when he got to the chapter on bug’s.
