Engraving speeds - Advice Required

[ncamacho2000]

Hi - Im sure someone on here has vast knowledge of this.

Im currently engraving a photograph and some writing onto laser ply, im always hearing that engraving slowly on lower speeds gives better quality results. Im engraving on (power 25 - speed 100). It seems good quality, trouble is its taking about 5 hours to engrave. The size is 60 x 40 cm.

Anyone tell me if i would loose much quality running faster and at a higher power, what do most people engrave at? Im pretty sure the writing would be ok at high speeds but may loose quality on the photo.

All help appreciated

Thanks

Nigel - 6040

[exengrav]

Try it and see. I engrave a lot of pictures, all at full speed ( 400 on my 3040 and 800 on my 9060 ) and can see no difference between the two in terms of quality. If there is an improvement, it is not significant enough to justify the extra time to me personally.

[endcan]

Hi on our 6090 we use speed 600 power 35 make sure engrave settings are bi directional and check your scan gap chris at HPC normally uses 0.5 but on wood where there is a grain you can get away with 0.08 or 0.1mm -this takes half the time so 6 times faster speed then 1/2 the passes =lots faster !!!

[ncamacho2000]

Cheers for the info the laser is set to bi directional, but not sure about the scan gap settings, could you explain a little how these will help.

Cheers Nigel

[Tom]

The scan gap is how much the machine moves after each pass so at 0.1 is 10 times the distance than 0.01 so 10 times faster to finish

[laser]

Hi, I tend to us a speed of 400, power dependant on the wood and depth required. Scan gap between 0.05 and 0.1, 0.1 for softer woods, reduce it for harder woods. Never really turn off bi direction unless its really tiny lettering. And for best result go against the grain. Hope this helps.
Cheers Simon