How to laser engrave a thermos

[Julie Nickerson]

Hi all. I have a customer who brought me this thermos to have engraved:
http://shop.timhortons.com/Catalogue...8&productId=17
They want the bottom part which is stainless steel engraved. I am doing a dry run on this and the machine is going further than what I have it set up for. Is it the machine? Me? Or the shape of the thermos?

Thanks in advance

[Frank Corker]

If it's going further, then you must have your settings wrong. If you are using an Epilog the Centre/Centre is the thing to use. Failing that, in your Corel file, don't forget to measure from the edge of the page or where the edge is at 0/0

[Julie Nickerson]

Thanks Frank, but I'm a bit lost. Centre/centre? I have it set up to the length which is 11.25" and the engraving area is 3". I put the lettering to where I want it to go and it goes over 4".

P.s. sorry for taking so long responding. I posted this before taking off for a photo club meeting.

[Dee Gallo]

Julie,

I've read this three times and I'm confused. Is your page set up as 3" wide and 11.25" long, and your printer driver also set up to the same dimensions?

If you were to engrave a plain piece of paper, can you see where the engraving will be? If so, then simply place the thermos on that spot and re-focus. It should end up in the right place.

OR are you using the rotary? That would change everything.

I don't understand what you mean by (it goes over 4")... do you mean the lettering is moved over or stretched or starts at the 4" mark?

dee

[Julie Nickerson]

Hi Dee
Yes, the page is set up that way. I'm using the rotary attachment. When I'm doing glassware that is how I set up the page. I find it easier that way. The letter is stretched over the 4". This has me confused because this hasn't happened before.

[Dee Gallo]

Hi Julie,

If the lettering is stretching then you might have some slipping, do the letters have gaps in them? If that's the case, you might want to try Frank's technique of putting a small sandbag inside to add some weight to the thermos or putting masking tape around the mouth and bottom for more "grippage".

Keep us posted! dee

[Mike Christen]

Hi Julie

Are you doing the dry run using the red dot pointer? also are you using raster or vector mode?

[Julie Nickerson]

I never even thought of slippage. I'm only engraving two words onto it. I'll give it a try of weighing down. Thanks

Hi Mike. Yes, I'm doing the dry run with the red dot pointer. I have it set to raster.

[Mike Christen]

Hi Julie

Keep in mind when you raster engrave the head overtravels the actual engraving area so if your engraving is 3" long I would imagine the actual head travel would be about 4". One thing you may want to try is draw a box with a hair line (no fill) around your text and use vector cut to do a dry run with the red dot pointer for the placement. Hope this helps.

[Dan Hintz]

Or wrap the thermos in painter's tape, lower the power, and do a real test run...

[Greg Bednar]

<snip> I'll give it a try of weighing down. <snip>

Fill it with sand NOT water.

[Julie Nickerson]

Wow thanks guys for all of the help
Got lots of sand here so I'll give that a go.