What type of tape to use

[kpritscher]

Hello, New Glowforge owner here. Was wondering what type of tape to use over
my projects? masking, painters tape? I will be using plywood to cut out monogram circle.
all advice welcomed.
Thanks, Lauren

[evansd2]

The term you’re looking for is “masking”, the forum has a ton of conversations about it if you search. Here’s my favorite:

Cheapest 12" wide masking tape

whats the cheapest 12" wide masking tape that yall have found? I’ve seen it range from $39 to $139.

[brokendrum]

@kpritscher

masking

I prefer the Transfer Paper. Many brands and prices. This 300 foot roll goes a long long way, and I use it on acrylic, wood, leather, overspray protection (aka: about everything that needs a cover).

https://www.amazon.com/Paper-Application-Transfer-applying-graphics/dp/B078SYQFT6/ref=sr_1_3?s=arts-crafts&ie=UTF8&qid=1526730103&sr=1-3&keywords=medium+masking+paper

Once caution. Blue Painter tape is worse, but even these transfer tapes will eventually ‘set’ (glue finally dries). Even the very old proofgrade stuff will have this problem.
Very hard to remove once it does set. It only takes a few minutes to mask on demand with raw resources.

DO NOT use that sticky brown package tape. At least the version I had, it was impossible to remove from wood.

[bansai8creations]

Welcome!
Masking tape will work–until I bought some low-tack masking akin to the other links provided (pending your material, you may want low or medium tack), and for some jobs I used painters tape (both blue and the light brown). The tack is the most important, as you want it easy to remove–and I was doing this on some leather, so also tested how applying/removing it would affect the finish of the leather–in most cases I don’t mask leather.

You don’t always need masking–but best for materials you can’t clean easily afterwards. And little pieces of tape work great to remove soot from materials, too–for some of my leather that just rinsing & scrub with old toothbrush doesn’t do the trick, I use masking tape to remove excess soot.

The nice thing with the type of masking linked by @brokendrum is there are also many options for width, as well as the tack/stickiness, available, pending your project.

But if you need multiple pieces to cover the area being etched/cut, don’t overlap pieces, but butt them against each other. Better to have a little gap than an overlap as the extra thickness will affect the consistency of the etch/cut.

Good luck!