Stain before or after

[Mike Troncalli]

Hello,

I have to cut and engrave about 20 pieces of birch plywood for a customer. ( The engraving is small and is just names). They want them in natural, walnut and cherry stain. My question is would you stain before or after the engraving. My thoughts were to stain and put a shellac topcoat on first then engrave. But I have not had the need to engrave stained wood as of yet and want someones opinion that has done it before.

Thanks

[Dee Gallo]

If you want the words to show up lighter, put the finish on first. If you want them to show up darker, put the finish on after engraving.

that's my two cents, dee

[Michael Hunter]

Laquer/varnish before engraving makes cleaning up any smoke marks very easy.
Can't help with the stain thing.

[Chuck Stone]

I'd sand and use a shellac spit coat first, then engrave. Then use a gel stain
and wipe it off. That will put the stain in the engraving but it will wipe off of
the rest. (as will any charring) If you want to color the wood, garnet shellac
does a nice job of that, giving even color.

[Bill Stein]

I do quite a lot of the LaserBuzz products -- both dog ornaments and wall tributes. I always stain first and then cut. I don't use any sealer on top of the stain and don't have any problems with smoke (I don't try to clean them, I just leave them as they are). I don't do any rastering on these products -- all the text is done with vectors.

Bill

[Paul Buhse]

I find it best to do the staining and finishing first. After the engraving I do any necessary color fill. With the finish applied first, any resin or smoke marks clean up easily.

Paul

[Mike Troncalli]

Thanks for everyone's input.
Usually I shoot most raw wood with shellac first. (Easy to clean up smoke marks.) But of course when staining you can't put a sealer on first if you want your stain to show up properly. I ended up going with staining first, engraving and then a quick wipe down and shellac. With the dark stain the smoke marks really didn't show up much anyway.

thanks again for your imput.