Good morning Glowforge Community,
I hope all is well with everyone.
Please let me know if I can cut vinyl on the Glowforge.
And if so, what are the best settings?
Thank you,
Tonia
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no. the gas released will kill your machine
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Absolutely not.
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The simple answer is No. Real vinyl will produce chlorine vapors and form acids when burned by the laser. Those acids will eat your electronics in the GF - even with just a little cutting.
The complicated answer is “it depends”. There are materials called “vinyl” that aren’t in fact vinyl. The most common one you’ll see here is vinyl transfer tape which is used as masking. That’s actually originally used to allow the easy transfer of vinyl decals to another surface (like glass).
You need the SDS (used to be called the MSDS) for the material to see what the combustion byproducts are. If chlorine or hydrochloric acid are listed you don’t want to use it.
You can also do a burn test by heating a copper wire, touching it to the material to melt a blob of it in the wire end and then burning the blob with a propane torch - green in the resulting flame indicates chlorine in the combustion gasses.
The test and the SDS/MSDS info is useful because the other situation is also true - materials not called vinyl that are. A common one of these is faux leather products (PU Leather or pleather). It’s really vinyl and not a leather of any kind. Another one is the craft clay sold as Sculpy or Primo - polymer clay.
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Thank you so very much.
I appreciate it.
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Thank you so very much.
I appreciate your reply.
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Thank you so very much.
I appreciate it al of the information you’ve provided.
I’m glad I asked.
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It’s useful to know the whole story - otherwise it’s confusing when someone tells you to buy vinyl transfer tape when you want to mask your own materials 
And people sometimes get caught unawares using pleather or Primo clay.
There’s always more to know.
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Check out #4:
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That is the common misreading of this product. Many people think it means “transfer tape made of vinyl” when it actually meant “tape made to transfer vinyl”.
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And adding to that confusion, there are vinyl tapes ‘made to transfer vinyl’ cuts, and there are paper tapes.
We lasererers use it for masking. When shopping for it(because you forgot to search the forums for direct links and such) always be sure it is listed as “paper transfer tape.”
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Thank you so very much.
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