We own the Glowforge Plus(without passthrough). Sorry if this has been answered before, I did conduct a forum search prior to posting.
I have a piece of BB plywood that is 18L"x20W" it fits into the forge, but obviously a portion of it sits pass the honeycomb portion of the tray, onto the black smooth surface near the back. When I close the front gate, the piece fits snug(similiar to proofgrade).
My question is, is it safe to cut this piece down smaller, using the Glowforge, to say a normal 12L" x 20"W piece? We anticipate cutting a straight line across, 6" UP from the Front of the Glowforge, allowing us to remove that 6L"x20W" section and being left with a typical 12"x20" piece.
Yes, it’s safe to do, as long as you don’t let the material hang over the sides of the gridded portion of the tray. (And @jbmanning5 is correct, you won’t be able to cut all the way across it - you’ll have to cut most of the way and then break it. Which isn’t hard. I use a pair of pliers.)
But the OTHER thing that this means is that you can, in effect, do engraving on items (e.g. - an 18" round wood cutting board, Lazy Suzan, etc.) with a bit of manual alignment effort.
Also keep in mind that it’ll be slightly raised off the crumb tray. You’re likely to get some flashback burn; if you care I’d suggest masking the back.
Rather than getting exactly 12 x 20 when the maximum cut is 11" x 19.25 I have a Pro but have the wood cut into 19" strips as 5 x 19 = 95 leaving enough room for saw kerf. In a 48 x 96 sheets.
In your particular case a horizontal cut at 11" would be better as it would ,leave that extra inch on the smaller piece. However, you will need a hand saw where the cot will not reach.
Where I need to match the laser cut a heavy (0\0) jewelers saw blade is pretty close.
Thanks for the answers @Jules and @rbtdanforth that’s right. I’m going to close this thread - if you have any more questions, go ahead and post a new topic.