you might want something with a thicker consistency. maybe a wax? multiple layers allowed to soak in. i do have the feed’n’wax, and i need to buy a new tub of johnsons paste wax for a table of ours. maybe a small experiment is warranted.
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I knew you were the right person to talk to about this 
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I just happen to have a supply of carnauba wax, pine resin, beeswax, and Citra Solv. Hmmmmm…
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i have some paste beeswax arriving tomorrow, feed’n’wax (which is more liquid), and walnut oil. that would get us at least 6 options between us.
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I’ve got feed n’wax, briwax, danish oil, mineral oil, polyurethane and maybe one or two other finishes.
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This guy says that defocusing on wood can get darker engraves too. Kind of makes sense, you’re overlapping the engrave passes, sort of like increasing lpi but without the time penalty of multiple passes.
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I did actually try this… engraved at 3mm difference and it didn’t improve the contrast. Besides, the stuff I’m engraving is HIGHLY detailed, so this really wasn’t gonna work for me anyway.
I’ve more or less tried everything I can… and I do wanna stick with birch because of price and the fact that it doesn’t have an MDF core so I can stop gunking up my machine, heh.
I’m gonna try staining/sealing an engrave before removing masking… and then some light sanding. I know it’ll work, but the process is what concerns me.
I might fiddle with double engraving with a second pass that’s reduced power just to darken, but one of my sheets gets me 2.5 sets of coasters, but takes 5 hours with ONE pass of engraving at 1000 speed, lol.
I wanna just use a translucent stain that also seals in one go. Minwax Polyshade seems to be the best solution, even better that there’s an aerosol version, but the color/finish I want is gone EVERYWHERE. Any thoughts of using it through a spray bottle without clogging the thing after a single use?
The hope is engrave/cut, spray and leave it for 6 hours (over night), duct tape the masking away and light sanding with 400 grit… and compressed air or just use my airbrush to blow away dust.
Just up the price of your final products to reflect the more expensive materials.
If you spend 200% on nicer materials and then charge 3x as much for the final product, you can sell half as many and make a better profit margin with significantly less time.
The market is saturated with inexpensive coasters, maybe it’s time to leverage the custom angle instead of joining the race to the bottom on price?
Inexpensive cork ikea coasters:
Slate:
Hardwood maple:
Or if you want to make and sell lots of less expensive sets, go even cheaper, with paper:
Bonus there is that you could laser up a stamp and use the stamp to “letterpress” the paper coasters.
Anyway there are a million approaches to these things. I’m sure you’ll find a process that works for you.
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When I’ve had to engrave Baltic birch, I always mask and then dab some wood stain with a sponge brush (sparingly!) before removing the masking. If I’m looking for a non wood color color I’ll use Gilders Paste instead.
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This won’t work for me, unfortunately. The main stuff I sell on etsy is geared towards board gaming/table top gaming and they’re already priced kinda’ high for what they are.
Wyrmwood gaming would like a word with you:
As would many other higher-end gaming companies. There’s definitely a market for luxury gaming goods.
Dice trays and towers and other accessories in particular are definitely possible to make with a Glowforge. Custom higher end coasters are a relatively unexplored gaming accessory.
Of course you know your target market better than anyone, so I wish you luck in finding a better way to get contrast on your bb ply.
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this is one thing that is so hard for businesses to adjust to. and i totally get it. my BIL used to run his own computer consulting business. and as he started getting more business clients to balance out his residential clients, the residential clients became more of an issue for him. very time consuming for less consistent money (not to mention a lot of people trying to guilt him into accepting less money for his work). i kept telling him, you need to fire bad clients. you can do it by raising your rates. if you change from $25/hr to $40/hr, the bad customers will fire themselves and you work 25 hrs a week to make the same money you made working 40 hrs a week before (which leaves you 15 hrs to go find more good paying customers).
but it’s really tough to give up the customers you currently have in the higher volume/lower cost model to move into the lower volume/higher cost model.
not saying that’s where the OP is, just a very general comment about different business models.
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Yes, wyrmwood uses some high quality stuff, but I don’t have a C&C machine nor embed magnets, let alone inlays and line my stuff with felt. =) For what I make and design? I think I’m in the top levels of acceptable pricing, haha.
I would be very careful with any waxes or oils as they will flame up much easier.
That’s what I use on birch plywood. Mission Oak gives a nice even dark color.
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What are you making with the baltic birch plywood? That may impact my answer, but have you tried darkening the engrave after the fact? If you mask, then engrave, then with the masking still on apply dye or coffee or some type of stain, that might work. But without knowing the specific item you are making, I don’t know for sure that would be a satisfactory option.
The images I’m engraving are too detailed to safely stain after engraving. I tested it and the stain just bleeds into the wood even with masking still on.
I’m thinking if I finished my wood prior to engraving, it may help with the bleeding issue, but the surface would still have to be sanded afterwards and because of the detailed nature of it, the small details would still get stained.
In the end I think I found some settings and possibly a process that gets a dark enough engrave for my tastes… but I won’t get more wood until Friday, so I can’t test it just yet.
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and you have to use baltic birch?
(I personally would switch to something else. I love using maple most of the time, I have others, but it’s my favorite.)
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With masking on spray with clear lacquer. That will seal the engraved fibers and prevent wicking when spraying (or brushing) afterwards with the color coat.
Nope, not if you’re going to color the engraving. Prefinish will simply seal the top pores but when you engrave you’re cutting into the wood and exposing new open capillaries to suck up the color coat.
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