Camping on the Roof

Have never seen a slate tile roof in WV but somehow I ended up with a box full. Of course everything looks like a blank slate when you have a laser. Grabbed a broken tile for this test. Uploaded a simple drawing of my Xterra SUV and attached tent. Pressed Print. Slate does not accept shading very well and you should to be aware that the image will appear as a negative, but it works great for line drawings.

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holy C^&* that is awesome think about the possibility’s for like a foot path to the house or the pool etc…

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The business that I run is in an early 1920s mansion that has a slate roof. I need to scour the grounds around the house because I know there ate tiles that fell off. Never thought to grab them!

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Totally cool, and I’m super envious! (no slate roofs around here either) :worried:

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:astonished:

I didn’t think about it until you said that! Amazing, perfect. I need slate.

PS. @rpegg this really came out great!

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How deep can you go on slate? Would you be able to cut deep score lines so you can shape it?

Aww, I miss my xterra! Couldn’t justify bringing it across the pond. So much space for art materials/projects…

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Looks great. Thanks for sharing. Lots of slate roofs around here in New England. Shortly after I ordered my Glowforge, we was at an architectural salvage store and I grabbed 10 slate shingles. I can see lots of possibilities.

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We have a couple of pieces of slate from a 200-year-old roof that we use as cheese boards. We use a piece a very hard chalk to write the name of each cheese that we are serving. I have a feeling that our cheeseboard is about to get more ornate.

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Nice! Pet memorials is another possible use.

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Hard to see any problems with your test. That is amazing on a material that really doesn’t get used as a lasering medium.

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No. You can’t even feel the engrave above. It’s more of a bleaching effect. I used far more power on a piece of slate like tile my first week and was able to get a mark that you could get your fingernail into. But not much more.

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We have three of them. The wife uses hers as a portable art studio and camping vehiicle. A pickup with 4WD would work as well in these hills but can’t throw my upright bass in an open truck bed. The one I drive lost the transmission yesterday at about 210K. Praying that I can flush it as a quick fix. Otherwise, will be going online to find a reasonable 2015.

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Seems like we are going to have a near-limitless variety of materials to experiment with, once we all get our units of course :wink:

That contrast seems much greater than what I got, do you recall the settings?

The settings, as you know, don’t mean a lot on the low end right now. Engrave 5%/335/270

This was the original drawing:

Real slate reacted a lot differently than another man made material on the left. The octagonal tile that I originally thought was slate had a dark, almost melting look to the lines with the same settings.

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I am jealous of your box of slate. I love the material so much, I restore old burial grounds that are filled with the wonderful slate stones and just took a class on how to carve slate in hopes of eventually learning to repair them. Slate is one of the first things besides wood I’m putting in my GF.

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Thanks.
That other material sure looks like slate. maybe be a ceramic. The mineral content must be a factor also, the slate I did @50% 335 340 isn’t nearly that white.

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Of course if a material doesn’t engrave as expected, there is always spray paiint.

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I THINK the tile I found was slate, and it went pretty deep. They were rasters, though:

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/uploads/db6859/optimized/3X/a/a/aa31484243f6d3bf0f90b50c85d2a7468e0a3e74_1_666x500.jpg

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