New owner (well, almost)

[evansd2]

Useful:

Overall welcome Maybe too entry level?

Getting started

The Glowforge team recommends working through your first prints by following along with the examples shown here to learn where everything is: They have also recently added instructions with video on using the Manual settings here: Working with Manual Settings And there are methods for Enhancing your Photo Engraves and Cutting Out a Shape as well. (You can click on the topic headers in the left-hand column for even more information.) That particular page is also handy if you have any p…

This will help you figure out how to cut new materials, really useful skill to have.

New material cut test method

Don’t know what settings to use on a material? The only way to be sure is to test. Good news! You can effectively test on a thin strip on the edge of your material, it’s fast and easy. I use this shape to do so (SVG attached): [Material_test] Click here to download/save Or click here for the ZIP: Material_test.zip (3.3 KB) To use: Set the first operation to score (the numbers). You’ll use these to identify your cut pieces later. Set each of the curve shapes to a power/speed combo t…

Essential if you’re going to cut anything non PG (which you will, probably)

Cheapest 12" wide masking tape

Like @jbmanning5, I get perfectear plus from signwarehouse.com for $40 for a 300 foot roll, shipped. I’ve used both perfectear and transferrite, I prefer perfectear, but they aren’t that different. I was also tipped off to this one: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B085635HFN

What else might you need?

Newbie here... Recommendations for Accessories?

My first recommendation is to search the forums thoroughly. There are a bunch of posts like this that go deep. Lemme find one for you. (Be sure to read the discussions that are linked in there too. It’s a rabbit hole but it will answer questions you don’t even know you have.) Also there are a lot of “getting started” posts that can really get you headed in the right direction, here’s a good one: