Have you thought about a turning add-on to allow for glass cutting?

[lac1029uk]

Have you thought about a turning add-on to allow for glass engraving? (sorry for the external link but this is an example)

Creative Laser Applications for Business Owners and Entrepreneurs

Simply click through to the glass cutting section.

[takitus]

Its been discussed, but apparently there wont be enough room inside the glowforge to accomplish it. You might be able to hack a solution for it, but nothing officially supported by glowforge is going to be released from what weve been told up until this point.

[Just-Maken-It]

As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, Glass etching with a laser is not really the best way to etch glass due to the high likely hood of thermal shock that can easily cause the glass to break. I’ve seen this happen multiple times in a maker space using the Epilog solution you show in this post.

[smcgathyfay]

I have found the cheaper the glass, the better it does on the laser…lol Definitely doesn’t do well with leaded crystal. Also covering it with either wet newsprint or wet tissue paper helps keep the lines crisp. I’ve also heard using dish soap but cannot attest to that.

[smcgathyfay]

I have a rotary engraver attachment for one of my other lasers and it’s 6" high. You would need at least 7.5" clearance from the bed of the laser to fit it in. So yeah, it won’t fit into the GF…

[bbrackin2]

I have engraved glass with an engraving machine that used water to help prevent cracking and chipping. I imagine the machine was expensive, but it performed very well and was easy to use. Was only set up to engrave glassware, not flat surfaces.

[marmak3261]

Theoretically we could rig something up for test tubes. My thought was drum sticks or muddlers.

Hardware Addon - Idea

I have an idea for a simple rotary attachment/addon. You wouldn’t be able to engrave a rolling pin or baseball bat, but maybe a pen or set of drumsticks. It would be fairly simple to build, you could even use your new glowforge to cut the gears! Basically it is a micro stepper motor attached to a pair of rollers. An arduino attached to the motor and an IR sensor. It doesn’t need any physical connection to the glowforge. My idea is that you use the laser “defocused” to send a pulse to the IR sen…

[lac1029uk]

Thank you this is the kind of thing I was thinking of. I know that the GF has very little clearance but by replacing the bed with this kind of device you would be able to lazer a shot glass.

[Scott.Burns]

LOL, when I first glanced at your post, I read “drumsticks or noodles.” Designer spaghetti, anyone?

[bwente]

You can laser cut a polyester (laser safe) stencil and then use a chemical etching creme.

[JLabs]

Even without a rotary attachment the glowforge is ideal for cutting stencils for use in sandblasting or chemical etching of bottles and glass.