Playing around with gold laser foil from Johnson Plastics. Both tests were done as a score. The scrap, blue acrylic test looks okay, but I need to reduce power so it cuts the foil without marking the acrylic as much. Don’t be fooled by the wonky font, the laser was very precise. Also, I have noticed, through this forum, that actual pieces often look better in person than in photographs. I guess our photography technology has far surpassed the human eye in perceiving minute detail.
The Glowforge logo is on an anodized aluminum dog tag. The laser foil worked great on the aluminum!
Cool! So, how does the laser foil work? You place it down on the work piece and set the laser to running. Then, what’s left is the parts that have fused with the piece as you show? I’m not familiar.
I bought the same laser foil a few months ago. I’ve only used it once, but it was pretty awesome. You cut the foil with scissors to the size of what you want. Peel off the backing and it adheres to your material. Then you cut/score your design. Then you peel off the excess. When I watched the tutorial videos I thought “So this is going to be really difficult to weed and I’m never going to want to use this again.” But one thing they say is “Peel off your excess immediately after cutting your design as it will bond with your material the longer it stays on it.” Well, they’re right. I was able to easily peel off the excess, leaving my desired design shining. It’s difficult to tell in the picture, but it really reflects light brightly.
I’m sure I did press it again, but so much of the detail was super-small, so really I couldn’t touch most of it. I saw my cousins toward the end of the year and they told me how much everybody loved the gifts and they specifically said the snitch is their favorite.
Awesome! I have a roll of that same foil but haven’t played with it yet. Please share your settings (probably need to go in Beyond the Manual) once you get it dialed in.
I just did another test on acrylic. started with the settings for draft score on Proofgrade medium clear acrylic, but reduced the power down to 14. Could probably go even lower if I decide to.
You got that! I was just thinking of that today. I wonder when I’ll hit the equivalent cost in materials and cool stuff that I paid for the Glowforge in the first place.
