Finally! How to cut cardstock without smoke stains and without engraving

[becca]

I spent hours this afternoon trying to cut white cardstock without soot stains.

I went through multiple posts and came up with these settings for cutting Micheal’s 65lb cardstock.

You are going to want to have a sticky board that you can put your paper on. Having the paper blowing(even a little) will prevent it from working as well.

I then used these settings

Power-8
Speed-300
Passes-3

I found that having very low power and using multiple passes stopped all of the smoke issues I was having.

There is still a little bit of a brown edge but I think it looks cool. I just really hate the soot on the paper.

[evansd2]

@becca

You are going to want to have a sticky board

Or…

Vacuum tray replacement for cutting lightweight materials

The chase: [image] So I made a fullsize tray replacement vacuum table. The idea is that it allows me to cut very lightweight materials without worrying about flyaways. A quick disclaimer: It’s possible that this is a fire risk, airflow and contained spaces and all. I feel as though it isn’t, but I’m just a dude with a laser who thinks he’s got decent risk assessment skills. Use your noodle if you try something like this Say you wanted to cut some rolled trace paper: [imag…

Or…

How to manually control the air assist fan power

Disclaimer: If you are unsure of either of the following: “why would you want to do this?” “what problems could this cause?” … then turn around and walk away, this isn’t for you (I am only half kidding!) The bottom line is that this may elevate your fire risk, reduce your air assist fan life, or cause a change to the fumes generated by your cuts. It may not do these things too, there’s just not enough data to say for sure either way. I’ve been using them for some time wit…

[dklgood]

Thanks for this. I am going to move this to Beyond the Manual as that is the only place we can discuss settings for non Proofgrade materials.

I think many people will save lots of time if they read this post. Thanks for sharing your experience. The result looks great!

[deirdrebeth]

Nice work coming up with good settings. Because they’re non-PG settings I moved your post to Beyond the Manual

I’m sure lots of folks will find this helpful!

I totally thought of the vacuum tray while reading this

[jamely]

Another good tip is having your sticky board be made out of acrylic! I found that when I cut on wood I got a lot more smoke deposits than with acrylic. I’ll have to try your settings to avoid the edge soot.

[Deleted]

THIS is gonna be perfect for my next project!

THANKS!!!

Jonathan

[rvogt]

Thanks for the settings. It almost looks as if there are NO soot marks on the back but i can see the brown line on the front. Perhaps cutting inversely would take away the ‘soot’ look entirely. Thanks again!!

[celesteprobichaux]

Bookmarking these settings for future use. Thank you for sharing.

[wesleyjames]

“Next”? Seeing how you take to things like the guitars, I think you mean your next 23!

[Deleted]

Actually, if you read some of my other posts, I picked up 100 paper dies, a a estate sale with a ***ton of ‘scrap booking paper’ – so I am using my glowforge as a cricket with a lightsaber.

[evermorian]

@Deleted

a cricket with a lightsaber

Jumpin’ Jiminy!

[wesleyjames]

As if crickets didn’t have enough firepower on their own.

[Deleted]