I am printing on both sides of the same acrylic sheet, using a single Illustrator document where the artwork for both sides is positioned identically. The alignment targets and red cut outlines are exactly the same on both sides.
Workflow
I print both sides first — the art side and the number side.
I place the sheet on the laser with the number side facing up, because that side includes the registration targets used for LightBurn’s Print and Cut alignment.
I run the Print and Cut wizard.
The cut aligns perfectly to the number side.
When running the Print and Cut wizard, I am very confident that I am placing the laser red dot precisely in the center of each printed target, so the alignment process itself appears correct.
The Issue
The number side aligns exactly as expected.
The art side, even though it uses the same layout, ends up shifted by about 1/16 inch, always in a consistent direction.
The printed targets are in the correct locations.
The cut paths and artwork are positioned identically in Illustrator.
Both sides were printed before cutting, so the cut should land correctly for both.
Summary
LightBurn is correctly aligning the cut to the number side, but the artwork on the opposite side does not line up with the cut — despite:
identical coordinates for both sides
identical targets
identical cut paths
precise red-dot targeting during Print and Cut
same workflow
I need help understanding why the back (art) side ends up misaligned by 1/16", even though both sides originate from the same master layout and both were printed before cutting.
Are you doing a Print-and-Cut alignment with material targets and layout targets on both sides of the acrylic sheet?
If so, how do you align the material targets through the sheet? I’d be tempted to laser a pin hole through the material at each target location to transfer the position from top to bottom.
If not, are you using a fixture to align the sheet when you flip it over? If the material targets aren’t perfectly centered on the sheet they will be misaligned when it’s flipped it over and tucked against the fixture, so the design will be offset by the asymmetry of the sheet.
More details & photos of how you’re doing the alignment will help us see what you’re seeing.
Ran the pinhole test as suggested. See photos below. As you can see there is a difference. I have a jig that holds my material when I print it. Going to have to figure a way to either print more precisely which looking at the pin hole is all ready tight because the jig is fixed or compensate on the cut side. Scratching my head at this point. Any recommendations would be appreciated.
Put the laser at each design target in the LightBurn workspace
Skootch the material around on the platform to align the material targets to the laser positions
That means ignoring the fixture for the backside and aligning with manual fiddling. However, if you’re in production, which is what it looks like, manual fiddling about is not what you want.
In that case, you must find & fix why the pattern isn’t equidistant from the left & right / front & back edges of the material sheet. If it’s not exactly equidistant, then flipping the sheet over can’t line up the targets.
I haven’t figured out what’s going on with the printed sheets on the two sides, so I may misunderstand the problem.
If the printed sheets aren’t aligned with each other, which is kinda what the second picture looks like, then there’s a problem upstream of the laser where you stick the sheets onto the acrylic out of alignment and the P-n-C laser alignment isn’t the problem.
Tell us more: how do you get those two printed sheets onto the acrylic in perfect alignment?
From what I can see……from your photos is your targets are not equidistance from edge of your workpiece. In other words if the target isn’t exactly the same from edge of workpiece on both right and left side you are not going to get a centered space when you turn it over.
