I am working on some marquety that will go on a panel door.
The design is roughly 12" tall and the panel is about 26".
What I need to do is cut the design into 2 pieces of veneer, which will come together on the final glue up.
I have in mind to cut the background at a stragetic point in the design and do that shape on 2 pieces of veneer that are shorter than 20". Then, I can put together the 2 pieces of background on the design, having left an overlap which I will cut on a line.
What I’m not sure about is whether I can cut the outline of my design on a piece of veneer where some of the design will not be over the veneer. I want to cut out only a small amount of the background so the grain lines up (or mostly lines up). It’s easy if I can run the laser over nothing for a bit. But, if I must, I could put a sacrificial piece of veneer under the blank space.
If I’m understanding you correctly, you’d like to laser a bit over some blank, no material, space, yes?
That’s safe to do, the GF is designed for that. If you’re concerned and/or want to avoid flashback on your veneer you can also put the good veneer material on top of a sacrificial sheet of whatever (draftboard, plywood, etc).
I think I would split the design in my software and not spend any tube time cutting something that isn’t there.
There is probably something in your workflow that eludes me.
Alignment is hard with 2 separate pieces cut on the laser out of the same shape. When you cut veneer for marquetry with a scroll saw or by hand, you set 2 layers of wood on top of each other and you cut thru both on a line. At a slight angle, so you get the cork and bottle effect. With the laser, you are cutting thru 1 sheet. So, what I will do is cut the same shape partially thru each separate piece and align on the shape. With blue tape to hold in place. Then I can make a straight cut thru 2 layers. Not an at angle, not with a straight cut.
Pretty confident this will work. I’ll know better tomorrow when I try it out!
Because the beam has a waist and converges to the focal point and then diverges, you can invert a piece of the design so the adjoining faces match the angle of the adjacent face, if that makes sense.
I understand a double cut for fit, we did that in carpet laying. I have wanted to explore Marquetry, since I have a tool that can be graduated by thousandths. That, and I have a stack of veneer begging for an application.
That, and I have a stack of veneer begging for an application.