I’m trying to get machine to etch anodized .620 diameter cylinder. Having trouble telling software what material it’s working with. Plus it won’t take over .500 in setting. I’m used to a Swiss lathe and cnc mill that i can manually establish xy&z zero points so this thing is different and takes a while to find center itself.
Any help will be appreciated.
Thanks
Welcome to the forum.
You will need to take the honecomb tray out to engrave anything taller than 1/2"
The surface to be engraved must be between 1.5" and 2" from the bottom of the Glowforge without the tray because the focus length of the lens is 1/2" Your best bet is to use the set focus tool rather than set a focus height. You will select uncertified material and then manually input your speed/power/lpi settings.
If you haven’t worked through the first projects/tutorials, I strongly suggest you do that before embarking on this project.
To work on something that thick, you are going to need to remove the tray and create a jig that props up the cylinder into the correct range for the laser to focus on it. (Anything over about 0.45" tall should be done that way.) The @kittski diagram shows it best:
In your case, you will need a prop that is exactly 1 inch tall. That will hold the top surface of the cylinder at the correct height for the laser to be able to focus on it. (Correct range is from 1.4" to 1.9" as measured from the bottom metal bed of the machine.)
When you use the Set Focus tool, you will have to make sure that the little red targeting laser lands on top of the curved surface though, and that is going to be tricky. Since you have the tools for it, I’d suggest a simple jig to hold the cylinder at the correct height and give yourself some flat surface to use for the target laser.
Ok, Thank you and i will go ahead and work thru some more tutorials before i tackle this.
Thanks
Great, This is very helpful. I can make a fixture like that fairly quickly.
Thank You!
Thanks, but the good one isn’t mine! 
I made the fixture this morning and worked great. I have a cnc router also so that helps a lot. Thanks so much for the help!
