Media Blasting Wood

[Brian Leavitt]

I'm going to make a new number sign for my dad's house. I've decided on wood and I want to deep etch it. The only blasting media I have is aluminum oxide. There are two ways I'm considering doing this sign. First is cutting a vinyl mask and just blasting it. Second it masking the wood (not with vinyl), lasering it, and then blasting the lasered wood to get the natural wood color back. I'm pretty sure the second method will work, but I'm not sure whether or not aluminum oxide will deep etch wood by itself. I've searched around and I can't find any information on this. Anyone have any input?

[Mark Canada]

I haven't tried it... but as a thought, sandpaper is aluminium oxide, so at least you know it will sand the wood away as you blast it.

[Matt McCoy]

Aluminum oxide will work fine. I'm not sure about the vinyl resist, though.

There's a sign making forum here, I believe.

[Gary Hair]

For deep etching on wood you'll want something much thicker than vinyl. Anchor makes quite a few different stencil products that are laser friendly and come in various thicknesses as well as adhesive types, you want . AO will work fine but you can use silica sand, with proper respirators and taking all precautions due to silicosis, and it's much cheaper. Once you use your media on wood, it's garbage.

Here is a link to Anchor's stencil products. https://www.itape.com/en/products/stencil I use 116 on stone, bricks, pavers, etc., but it's much thicker than you need for wood and is high tack, you probably want medium tack.

[Paul Phillips]

Aluminum oxide will work, what is involved is that the finer the grit you use the more contrast you will get with hard and soft grain, the coarser the grit the better as a general rule, also depends on the type of wood and the how the grain looks within each piece of wood, a soft vertical grain wood will have a lot of raised ridges, horizontal may look nicer with your suggested process.

[Brian Leavitt]

Thanks for the input, fellers. I typically use my blasting cabinet for glass or to clean up the occasional car part. I have never had a good reason to try deep etching like this. I'll have to look through Anchor's product line. Looks like they have a ton of options. This is going to be a pretty small sign, and will probably be the only one I ever do, so I might just laser it and then hit it with the blaster to clean it up for staining.

Thanks again,
B

[Gary Hair]

Thanks for the input, fellers. I typically use my blasting cabinet for glass or to clean up the occasional car part. I have never had a good reason to try deep etching like this. I'll have to look through Anchor's product line. Looks like they have a ton of options. This is going to be a pretty small sign, and will probably be the only one I ever do, so I might just laser it and then hit it with the blaster to clean it up for staining.

Thanks again,
B

Check with a local sign shop or sandblaster, one or the other may have a small piece of stencil that would work for you.

[Joe Pelonio]

The Anchor resist is not cheap, and is sold by the roll. You also need the adhesive which is also expensive and won't keep all that long, though contact cement also works. I have done the sandblasted effect using Cedar on the laser. Engrave out as deep as you want, then use a pebble-finish black/white/gray gradient instead of solid black, and make a few more passes at higher speed, lower power to clean it up and get more texture. This may not work as well on harder woods like oak.