Accessorise!

Her.

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That was chauvinistic of me. My mother would be disappointed.

A technique I am teaching myself at the moment: Acrylic welding.

Acetone
Scrap Acrylic
A squeeze bottle with a needle-tip applicator (and make sure the bottle doesnā€™t dissolve in acetone, many plastics do)

You dissolve a bit of acrylic in acetone, and put the resulting solution in the squeeze bottle. When you make a new acrylic piece on the GlowForge, you hold two pieces of acrylic together in their final resting configuration, and squirt a bit of your solution between the joint. Acetone dries up quickly, leaving the acrylic which was suspended in the solution to form a very tight (and nearly invisible) bond, holding the parts together.

Pieces hold themselves together decently well in under a minute. But the bond is supposed to be strongest 24 hours later.

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This is a great tip, especially for curved pieces! Remembering my work with Acrylic in high school a few decades ago, we put a thin layer of acetone in a flat tray, and held the edge of one of the parts in it for a bit, then we were able to place it against the other piece and it would weld. Your plan would waste less acetone to evaporation, and would be a lot better for the air quality in our houses too. That wasnā€™t so much of an issue in a wide open shop with great ventilation in the 70s!

I seem to have a talent of finding dead threads to reply toā€¦

Initially, my installation may need an exhaust boost, so a duct fan might be in order.
The first tool purchased to augment my laser workflow is a harbor freight special - a benchtop combination disc/belt sander to prepare wood for the laser.

Because I have been doing grinding, welding and plasma cutting in my shop for years, Iā€™m all set for fire control. (the Navy does a number on everyone with fire training)
The most valuable supplement for your laser is common sense.
If time will not allow you to monitor the laser from start to finish, donā€™t start the burn.
Unless you have a volitile material in the laser, a small flair from a class A fire is no big deal (as long as you are paying attention).
Combustion requires three conditions, fuel, temperature and oxygen. Remove any one and the fire is out.
I once smothered a friendā€™s motorcycle completely engulfed in flame ( class B fire) with a wet blanket.
To avoid blasting your $2,000 tool with a fire extinguisher, a simple solution would be to drop a damp washcloth on the flair.
Absolutely a Co2 extinguisher should be immediately available, but personally I would use it as a last resort.
I havenā€™t seen anything in videos that I couldnā€™t reach in and snuff with my thumb.
When I paint, I always have a wet T-shirt wrung out and standing by for any slips. Having a damp rag poised by your laser could be a valuable accessory.

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