Engraving Alignment Question

[Darrin Davis]

Here's my situation. I engraved the plate shown below on a large sheet of aluminum. I didn't have my ruler guides set up perfect on the laser yet so it didn't come out square. The result was that I had to shear off all 4 sides of the engraved plate to make it square.

Now I need to add another name to the plate and make it line up perfectly with the others. I still have the file but I'm not sure how to align the laser so that it will engrave the next name perfect or near perfect under the 2013 name. The other picture below shows my setup options for my laser engraver which is a GCC LaserPro Mecury III 25 watt. Any suggestions or will I have to start over with a new plate?

settings.JPGplate.JPG

[Mike Null]

I believe would change the position mode to center and enter the name. Then using blue painters tape or something similar in the location you wan to add the name I would run the file at a test setting for positioning. When you're satisfied with the positioning the reset your engraver settings and run the job.

Then before you do another job square your rulers.

[AL Ursich]

I have a similar situation with my hobby CNC and I made a crazy post in the CNC section about a "peek-a-boo' board. You could do a similar with a thin clear sheet of some type of a acrylic. Make it a masking tape hinged piece in your laser bed. Laser the text at low power on the acrylic then slide the plate under and align. Flip up the hinged plastic and set proper power and off you go....

Good Luck,

AL

[Dan Hintz]

Put the painter's tape on your bed, engrave the plate outline and cut out the plate mounting holes. Align the actual plate holes with the tape holes and edges by eye, then add a small strip or two of tape to hold the plate down. Engrave your name. Shouldn't take more than 60 seconds to get it all in.

[Ross Moshinsky]

Do it again. A 12x24 sheet of aluminum is about $5 and engraving that will take maybe 15 minutes. You'll waste twice as much time messing around trying to fix your previous mistake.

[Kevin Gregerson]

Get a large sheet of heavy paper. Tape it down to the bed, draw up a file that matches your laser bed size Simply light engrave a perfect rectangle of your engraving surface and raster in measuring marks. You can even create squares if you want. Just make sure it's accurate. Then you've got your square lines use those.

[Ross Moshinsky]

14 years left on that plate (including this year). Do you really want to have to fiddle with it every year?

[Gary Hair]

14 years left on that plate (including this year). Do you really want to have to fiddle with it every year?

Exactly...

Square up your guide rulers and do it over!