I cut everything from Felt, to Leather, to Wood Veneer. Would I be able to use magnets to hold down my materials without it affects the laser head? Or will it cause Electromagnetic interference?
I want to use small but strong magnets to hold everything down flat and solid.
chris1
February 25, 2018, 8:35pm
2
Many many people do this. I don’t think I’ve seen any definitive reports of it causing trouble.
1 Like
shop
February 25, 2018, 8:36pm
3
magnets are awesome. i rarely cut anything w/o a few magnets holding position or edges down.
mostly i use magnets i took out of a bunch of old hard drives. those things work great.
2 Likes
I am using fairly strong neodymium bar magnets with no issues so far. They are strong enough that I have wrapped them with gaff tape flags to make picking them up easier. I am sure there are other people here doing something similar.
4 Likes
evansd2
February 25, 2018, 8:54pm
5
Entire thread about this:
Hi all. There have even plenty of posts about using magnets to hold stuff down (and the alternatives to using magnets at all). I’m going to use the “just enough for the job” approach, and so haven’t yet needed to use the super powerful neo-mags yet.
I was wondering though, for any of you who have logged more cutting time (ie, most of you), has anyone noticed the really strong magnets actually impacting the cut? Like pulling at the head or anything like that? I’m super paranoid that these ti…
What to do with them once you have em?
So up until today my magnet organizational system was “put them somewhere that isn’t too close to the others” so they wouldn’t ball up into a finger-pinchy mess.
Today I went to Home Depot and spent 3$ on a nice big steel bar:
[image]
Devised a 2 layer mounting bracket and screwed it onto the workbench. No more magnet mess.
Alternatives?
the best laser results are achieved with flat (non warping materials) in order to maintain consistent focus. Also, when cutting light materials like paper, the exhaust turbulence can kick up the material and ruin your job or at worst… catch fire. (speaking of which, I hope you all keep a small fire extinguisher in easy reach, near your machine - safety FIRST)
I hope you find these useful. I used to 3d print them for my other laser cutter but occasionally , they would see the wrath of the laser …
Potential Magnet pitfalls?
I have been printing a sign for a local restaurant. I am supposed to deliver it in a few minutes. The other side is done… and it took over an hour. This side was just about done… but then I took a look at it and one of my magnets slid.
[MVIMG_20180208_093536] If the alignmentworked, I suppose I could salvage it. ARRRGH!
Any advice>?
Another alternative? Do more with magnets?
I admittedly am not a master of CAD. Therefore my designs have been generated in nothing other than PowerPoint and then saved as a PDF. I found I can actually do a lot and the accuracy is up to 1/8" which is the thickness of the material so it works out nicely. The laser does pass over cuts more than once using this method so it’s not perfect but it is what I have at the moment. (Disclaimer done)
I wanted to be able to place material securely that is smaller than the bed. I also wanted it t…
Short discussion that led to magnets?
Hello GF community,
I was wondering if anyone has had any success with creating some sort of clamp or jig that can be used in the laser bed to keep all four corners of a 1/8" piece o12"x20" plywood (or anything for that matter) flat on the surface of the bed.
Unfortunately, proofgrade plywood (which tends to be flatter than what I can get) will not work for most of what I want to do as I like to do the finishing myself.
I am currently using a combination of painters tape and magnets to adhere…
I suppose what I’m saying is that searching here for “magnets” will yield a lot of content. Like so:
https://community.glowforge.com/search?q=magnets
4 Likes
I was using magnets with no issues.
These holddowns designed by @eljefe4 are fantastic though. I’ve been using them a lot.
the best laser results are achieved with flat (non warping materials) in order to maintain consistent focus. Also, when cutting light materials like paper, the exhaust turbulence can kick up the material and ruin your job or at worst… catch fire. (speaking of which, I hope you all keep a small fire extinguisher in easy reach, near your machine - safety FIRST)
I hope you find these useful. I used to 3d print them for my other laser cutter but occasionally , they would see the wrath of the laser …
6 Likes
tim1724
February 28, 2018, 2:31am
7
That’s exactly what I use. I have a few different sizes of magnets but lately I’ve mostly been using these big ones: (I also keep some smaller round ones handy for when I need to fit them into small spaces.)
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B072K5SLXK/
And I too wrap them in gaffer tape. Teal gaffer tape, because Glowforge. That not only makes them much easier to pull apart but also keeps them from breaking as easily when they inevitably jump a foot to snap back together.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B075RF86ZR/
4 Likes