I think this is bad_—— REAL BAD

That is why I watched the first ones like a hawk without looking away even.

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Acrylic really isn’t more likely than any other material to catch fire, and is less than some materials. You shouldn’t be leaving your GlowForge alone in any situation with any material that can result in fire. Use the default settings and you should be fine. The ProofGrade settings are good for pretty much any similar material. If your acrylic is 6 mm or 1/4 inch, use the PG thick settings. It should work fine.

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Try to cut some Corian sometime if you want a spark show. Works great, but does give quite a show.

And I am on a safari to understand mulberry composition. It is a particularly dense wood so it might have some interesting stuff in it. Wonder if it pulls up lots of silicates? I have no idea. Just wondering.

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I had a White Mulberry tree back in Orlando but while fast-growing I have never seen one more than about 30 feet tall and 18 inches in the trunk at eye level and I understood that to be the tallest variety. It is fast-growing but as often bush as tree. Fine for making paper but where might one find laserable wood?

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I have a theory about that. Since mulberries are fast growing and gnarly and seem to be happy just popping up everywhere, they tend to be cut down in the US, especially because no one likes the purple pooping birds and the fruit staining everything. There can be big trees.

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So what were the exact settings you used?
Having similar issues with the same wood.

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It has been a long time since I cut this material so I believe this was the recipe .

Go into the dashboard. Choose uncertified material. Material thickness .20

Go to manual settings Cut, speed 140, full power

Make sure material is completely flat. Use honeycomb pins.

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So are you saying that the thinnest part of the beam should be right at the surface of the material? I literally just got my glowforge a couple days ago so I’m a total n00b! :grimacing:

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Everyone starts somewhere, we were all noobs when we first used the laser. :grin:

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There are some special effects that use a defocus technique*. Like any special effect, it’s not something you want to do all the time. And it’s almost never used for a Cut operation unless you are tweaking the kerf for finger joints (or similar).

*The technique does not use such an extreme setting as the example used.

@jbmanning5 said it way better than I could have. Look up his posts, they go way back and are a roadmap of experience for the rest of us to learn from.

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Yup, exactly. That creates the highest energy density for easier cutting, and a smaller cutting area.

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