Has anyone else had problems with the cherry not staying attached to the core?
I make magnets with quotes engraved on them, and have about half a sheet of unusable (unsellable, anyway) of product because the inside of an “e” or or “O” or other similar letter comes off during the unmasking. And I’m pretty gentle.
Anyway, is this just the nature of the product, or am I getting bum sheets?
I haven’t had that happen – PG cherry plywood is my favorite!
I know, it’s so pretty! But this is frustrating and disappointing. It’s happened with three different sheets.
Try shallower engraves, and use a bolder font to get the “depth” you’re looking for. Looks like you’re hitting the glue layer, and that small bit of wood just can’t hold…
Having cut the same file from both the medium and thick cherry ply, I was surprised that the thick actually weighed less than the medium.
So there is a difference in composition.
But I thought the point of the PG was it was supposed to be plug and play. No fiddling.
And the thing that confuses me is that it is totally inconsistent. It’s more like the core is breaking, rather than the cherry “popping” off.
They cannot obviously take into account every font or drawing that could possibly be used. Which proofgrade engrave is it selecting for your text?
Yeah, that happens if you don’t remove the masking very carefully from tiny little extrusions…on any of the materials. If the island is really tiny, it’s going to be prone to breaking with the least amount of pressure.
I use either the Gorilla tape, or a plastic razor blade, to carefully scrape the masking off starting at one edge. The razor blade works better on teeny little islands.
When you use the tape, press it on but not too firmly on the little extrusions - if you break them by pressing down too hard on them, they’re going to come out of there. When you peel off the tape, pull it back on itself, not straight up.
And you can always glue the little dot back in with a touch of wood glue. It will last longer than the other ones that didn’t fall out. 
To help pinpoint the problem, are you using default Proofgrade settings? Which one did you chose?
The thick ply seems to have a different core. I have not had this problem before, but that might be dependent on the font. It has to be frustrating.
Hard to tell if it’s that sheet unless you have tried it on another, which you don’t want to mar. Have you tried to separate the top veneer manual, such as on an edge, to see if that sheet doesn’t have good adhesion? Good question to post.
i use gorilla tape. wrap it around my finger and roll back and forth to get masking off. works well, to be sure. but gorilla tape is not cheap!
Thank you for the pictures, @betseywalker. I’m sorry to your print didn’t come out as you wished!
Would you mind sending some in to support@glowforge.com so we can look into the materials you received?
