Dealing with smoke when cutting white hardboard

[Dave Wetterstroem]

First off I must admit that I am a total noob to laser cutting and engraving. My laser has only been set up for a week and I am still trying to get the hang of things.

My issue today is dealing with smoke on the surface when I am cutting. I am using a couple of different products and getting the same issue with both. The first is 1/8 White Durowood from Laserbits and the other is 1/8 Eucalyptus White Hardboard from Home Depot. I like the appearance of the later better and the fact that it is a FSC certified product gives me another thing to add to the description from a marketing standpoint.

I have tried a number of combination of speed and power and any that cut all the way through left a fair amount of smoke around the edges. This cleaned off, but adds another 5 minutes to the production time that I would rather avoid. I did notice when cutting a plain uncoated hardboard that I had nearly zero smoke issues. This would lead me to think that it is the white surface that is causing this. The manufacture told me that the surface is just white acrylic paint.

Any suggestions?

Also, they claim that the product is paintable, but when I have tried with latex paint is rubs right off. If anyone has worked with this material, do you have any suggestions for finishing it?

Thanks

[Bert Kemp]

Most any material you cut is going to leave some residue on the edges. One thing that might help is to use masking on the board But I think this will add more time to cleaning as you have to put the masking on then you have to weed it off, I think you just have to clean the board when done. A clear coat on the surface will make cleaning easier.

First off I must admit that I am a total noob to laser cutting and engraving. My laser has only been set up for a week and I am still trying to get the hang of things.

My issue today is dealing with smoke on the surface when I am cutting. I am using a couple of different products and getting the same issue with both. The first is 1/8 White Durowood from Laserbits and the other is 1/8 Eucalyptus White Hardboard from Home Depot. I like the appearance of the later better and the fact that it is a FSC certified product gives me another thing to add to the description from a marketing standpoint.

I have tried a number of combination of speed and power and any that cut all the way through left a fair amount of smoke around the edges. This cleaned off, but adds another 5 minutes to the production time that I would rather avoid. I did notice when cutting a plain uncoated hardboard that I had nearly zero smoke issues. This would lead me to think that it is the white surface that is causing this. The manufacture told me that the surface is just white acrylic paint.

Any suggestions?

Also, they claim that the product is paintable, but when I have tried with latex paint is rubs right off. If anyone has worked with this material, do you have any suggestions for finishing it?

Thanks

[Keith Winter]

Ok a lot of questions here, I'll do my best to give you some things to try.

My best suggestion is you need to experiment with it and keep a journal, and sample board you write on with a sharpie. This is of coarse assuming this is something you plan on doing quite often? If so, the time you spend now will pay off in spades later... I typically do anywhere from 10-50 small sample cuts/engravings when I'm learning a new substrate. Most of these sample cuts/engravings can all be done on one or two sheets just do a single initial or single circle over and over adjusting your settings on each quick run till you get a setting you like. You can do all the tests very quickly since they are quite small.

Bert is right about the smoke, you can never eliminate it, only make it better.

Some things for you to try to help with the smoke
- Mask it off like Bert said
- Eucalyptus - Doesn't that have a lot of oil in it? Are you getting more smoke with the eucalyptus than the other?
- Adjust air assist, too much and it's going to blast the smoke all over your substrate, too little and it's going to have more flame ups which equal more smoke
- Is your ventalation adequate? Is the smoke lingering in the bed? Better airflow can help reduce the smoke on objects.
- Play with your PPI/HZ, this is the heat, some materials do better with more or less heat, wood for instance can actually char when cutting if your HZ/PPI is too high
- Play with your speed, power, and passes settings. Sometimes two passes is better than one. On wood you want it to get hot to get that dark look but, maybe not on other surfaces.

[Keith Colson]

I recently solved this issue when cutting plywood. What I do is block off the top vents in my machine and make sure all the air is going through the honeycomb. I then stick cardboard around the work piece to seal the top of the honeycomb. When it is all sealed up well, almost all of the smoke is sucked through the cut. This leaves a very clean cut. I have some powerful extraction too.

Cheers
Keith

[Michael Kowalczyk]

if you are not engraving , flip it over. and cut from the back other wise it should clean up easy with a damp cloth not wet

[Lee DeRaud]

The first is 1/8 White Durowood from Laserbits and the other is 1/8 Eucalyptus White Hardboard from Home Depot.

I always just did a quick wipe with alcohol on the stuff I used (some sort of MDF-based stuff intended for whiteboards), but I can see how, in a production environment, that would add to the cost.
You wouldn't happen to have the SKU number handy for the Home Depot stuff, would you? I haven't seen it in mine for years.

[Dave Wetterstroem]

Lee, http://www.homedepot.com/p/Unbranded...7562/204727075

I have emailed with someone from the company and was told that this product is a HDF with a white acrylic coating. The HD description states that it is paintable, but he said that their description is wrong and that it is NOT paintable.

As to testing, that is exactly what I have been doing. So far any settings that would cut through also produced quite a bit of smoke. I have only adjusted speed and power as those are simple concepts for a noob to understand. PPI on the other hand is not something I have adjusted, so that will be today's mission.

As to ventilation, I have a 2 hp Harbor Freight blower with a 4" line. The smoke seems to vacate the chamber very quickly. I have blocked off the right half of the vents when just using the left side, but never thought about covering up the balance of the honeycomb. I can see the benefit of doing so to force as much vacuum through the cut to evacuate the smoke away from the surface.

Thanks for all the help, I truly appreciate it and hope to become an asset to this board as I learn and am able to pass on my knowledge to others as you have here.

[Lee DeRaud]

Lee, http://www.homedepot.com/p/Unbranded...7562/204727075

I have emailed with someone from the company and was told that this product is a HDF with a white acrylic coating. The HD description states that it is paintable, but he said that their description is wrong and that it is NOT paintable.

As to testing, that is exactly what I have been doing. So far any settings that would cut through also produced quite a bit of smoke. I have only adjusted speed and power as those are simple concepts for a noob to understand. PPI on the other hand is not something I have adjusted, so that will be today's mission.

Showing "not sold" at all of the local stores I checked, possibly not available in California. Thanks anyway.
(I periodically go through instances of Home Depot MDF being almost impossible to cut...different supplier, I guess. I've gotten better at distinguishing the "good" stuff from the "bad" stuff, but it's not always that easy under store lighting.)

[Dave Wetterstroem]

OK, tried both lowering the ppi as well as blocking off the rest of the honeycomb. Neither seemed to help on any setting that would still cut through. Reducing the PPI did increase the cut speed by a fraction without making a noticeable difference on this product. I guess we will just be cleaning off smoke.

I did find some cheap rubber place mats that Kroger that work very well to place you work on while cleaning. They grip it nicely so that your work doesn't slide around.