I am trying to engrave on BBQ utensils and keep getting a message that the material thickness is not correct. I tried engraving without the crumb tray and it looked awful. What am I doing wrong?
It’s hard to get the thickness information correct on a skinny handle. The auto focus will take a measurement near the engraving, but if the object is thin like a handle, the odds of the Auto-Focus landing on the handle go way down. It’s more likely to land off to the side and give you an incorrect height reading.
The easiest thing to do to make sure you have the correct measurements and placement is to measure the height of the utensil above the crumb tray at the place where you plan to engrave it, and then hard code that information into the system. (digital calipers) You would enter that measurement in the Unknown Materials button at the top of the left thumbnail column. Then you also enter that measurement into the Settings for the Engraving operation in the thumbnail column.
The first entry will help you with placing the design correctly. The second entry will focus the Engrave and override any automatic measurements. It’s a good way to ensure that the measurements for alignment are correct.
(You can also create a raised jig and sink the utensils down into it so that the surface is flat and level on that plane, but that’s a lot more work and only really useful if you are doing a lot of them.)
Oh, and you do need to make sure that the handles on the utensils are under half an inch thick, or you will need to remove the tray, and prop the utensils up into the correct range for the laser to be able to focus on them.
The correct range is discussed here:
7 Likes
Thanks for your reply, @Jules, that’s super helpful information!
I’m sorry you ran into trouble with this, @tgwinnup. In addition to the tips @Jules shared, you may want to try using Set Focus, and keep an eye out for where the red dot lands. The Set Focus target allows you to select an area to take a precision measurement of the material’s height using the red dot in the printer head. It looks like the red dot missed the material on some of your prints. Use Set Focus and place the focus area on the material, so it’s not near an edge. Then watch to make sure the red dot hits the material.
I hope this helps! If you run into any other trouble, please open a new topic, or email us at support@glowforge.com.
2 Likes