Cork redeux

macphee · January 22, 2018, 4:49am

I’d been wanting to recalibrate my settings for doing cork since I got my production unit so I finally got some time to sit down and do a quick test. I still had some scraps from Ikea place mats. First was getting some reliable engraving settings. I found that using speed 1000 and power 20 with variable power setting for the greyscale worked well for me.

which resulted in an etch that didn’t dig into the material at all, but had nice crisp, dark lines.

ran some 3" coaster tests to see how I could cut as well. I ended up using power 100 and speed 300 which just cut through and pulled apart cleanly.

Now that I have working settings I’ll have to work up some nice sets to make for friends

destiney_glenn · January 22, 2018, 5:10am

Thank you for sharing your hard earned settings! Sharing is Caring! lol

Jules · January 22, 2018, 5:59am

Yeah, those are nice and dark.

cynd11 · January 22, 2018, 12:37pm

Nice! Now I want to do some cork.

bdm1 · January 22, 2018, 8:38pm

Interesting. My experiments engraving cork led to almost the same settings (1000/30).

caias_ward · January 23, 2018, 12:26am

Nice work.

You have a score setting, by chance?

robtichy · January 23, 2018, 12:54am

Aren’t head gaskets made from cork? Is that something that could be made on demand using a GF?!

macphee · January 23, 2018, 5:33am

I didn’t try for score settings, but if you start at 10-20% of cutting strength that’s probably a good start

rschenk · January 23, 2018, 3:23pm

Best score setting for me has been s200/p5

Nice dark, wide line without cutting too deep

tennessee_reid · January 23, 2018, 3:38pm

Best documentation and examples !!! Big Ups !!!

Brandon_R · February 4, 2018, 3:37am

What has everyone been using for vector engrave?

louissanders · August 3, 2018, 11:07am

Thanks for posting! I have recently bought cork and haven’t had a chance to test and your settings will definitely be a great help!

danielsalce84 · January 4, 2019, 6:30am

Question. After you laser the cork, what is the best method of cleaning the burn residue off? When I touch it it gets on my fingers so when I go to brush it off you smears over the image and stains it.

evansd2 · January 4, 2019, 3:14pm

Sounds to me like you’re burning too hard. Cork goes jet black with the barest touch. (5 or less power at high speeds)

If you’re set on going hard you could try sealing it first (cork sealant is on amazon), it might protect you from the soot.

mrinken · January 4, 2019, 3:34pm

Jules - do you automagically add the settings to the shared Google Doc or does everyone have to do that? And I TOTALLY need to bookmark that sheet - I’m starting to constantly search for it…

Jules · January 4, 2019, 4:04pm

Are you talking about the Google Doc that people are using to capture non-PG settings information? I believe that people are entering their settings to that individually. (I don’t use it, and I’ve never seen it…I keep an Excel spreadsheet with my own determinations on my desktop, so I can open it and grab the settings for a particular material next to the open app panel. Much quicker than scrolling on Google.)

pubultrastar · January 4, 2019, 4:05pm

Thanks for testing!

mrinken · January 4, 2019, 8:27pm

Yup! My bad - I thought you were the keeper of that.

Seeing as you answer EVERYTHING on the forums and are the resident guru!

Jules · January 4, 2019, 8:43pm

Chuckle! Not even close. (There’s so much fun stuff to learn and not enough time in the day to do it.)

ca_worth · January 4, 2019, 9:55pm

the ones I used in the past were steel and asbestos I think.

Cork would work great for a valve cover gasket, etc. it will blow out under high pressure. or in the case of a cylinder head simply burn through.