Test cut files using Affinity Designer is it possible?

[vossphoto]

Hi all,
My question is about those wonderful “Laser, cut and engrave test files” you see on Etsy. There able to help you dial in your setting with just about any material by adding a slight increase in power or slowing down the speed.
Supposed to be a great time and material saver. I not sure I understand the set-up process…
Do use supposed to manually set-up each separate cut manually, slowly varying each pass by a small amount? or is there some trick I’m missing. Are these files only for lightburn? I use Affinity Designer. Thank you in advance Friends.

[deirdrebeth]

There are quite a few, for free, right here in the forum. Yes, you set up the individual jobs - but, if it’s designed well - you do it all at once.

So you start with (Eg.) 100 power/100 speed and then you change one or the other by 10 - so 90 power/100 speed, then 80 power/100 speed, etc. Once you’ve got it set up you run the test on a scrap of your material and make a judgement call as to which you like best. Sometimes you follow up getting even more exact 81 power/100 speed, 82 power, 83 power, etc.

For cuts this is my favorite test:

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…

For engraves it’s this one (since you also want to test cuts usually):

Engrave and Cut 1/4" Mahogany tips?

This is the test I run on every new wood species and often on several to test what I want to actually use. but this first test runs the engraves at twice the number noted and then comes back and makes the cuts at the numbers noted and then cuts off the piece at two passes at 125 all full power. [evans%20tests] Watching closely while it is done allows me to put a wet cloth on after it cuts in the case where it starts to make charcoal,this is the Zebrawood piece after sanding it as the cut is de…

but seriously, if you do a search on here for “test” there are probably easily a dozen.

[rbtdanforth]

At one point I was using wood from a variety of sources, and did not want to use the entire piece of wood (or a major part of it) to find the best settings so I would use that second reference above, pen the name it was sold as, and keep them all in a box.

It not only showed the best setting, but also the nature of the wood. What is sold as mahogany is particularly problematic as it can be one of several species, including some that are very flammible and some that are not, so having that reference will also point out how flammable the wood is, by how badly the end was burned up.

[CMadok]

You would manually set them up. I created a test file before so i could test every speed/power option for materials. Loading it into the interface took firever because of “so many steps” and then setting each color to my desired combo took over an hour

Cermark Ultra testing on different materials

I’ve been meaning to share this and got a little busy. I was asked to test Cermark Ultra and see if I can nail down some starting settings for different materials. Rather than guessing what works best, I created a grid of many rectangles and assigned different speeds and powers to each…I do not recommend this…it was awful setting each in the interface, took over an hour. These are blanks that were provided to me-aluminum (approx, 1/8" thick), stainless steel (super thin business card thicknes…

[vossphoto]

thank you so much for your Help. Off to do some more testing…