Deer Antler Engraving

[Liesl Dexheimer]

I have someone with a custom turned deer antler pen. Does anyone know settings for something like this? I have a 35 watt laser. I may end up needing to have him provide me with a test piece...

[Bruce Volden]

Deer antler engraves just fine and is very similar to most woods.
The only precaution is not to engrave through the antler and expose the barrel of the pen assembly.
My settings on my TT for this type of engraving are 65P / 25S @ 400DPI.
HTH

Bruce

[Mike Null]

I would use your leather or plastic settings.. Be aware that this will probably be the stinkiest stuff you ever engraved.

[John Lifer]

Yep, wood setting are fine, And Yes, stinks worse than leather. Burning bone..... Ugh.

[Liesl Dexheimer]

Thank you for the recommendations and warnings about smell. I have asked my customer to provide me with a test piece just so I can experiment a little. Not really looking forward to the smell although at least the engraving will be small and under 30 characters, not like a paragraph of text.

[Kev Williams]

Antler PEN..?









===============
pretty tight quarters
and like a dummy I didn't get pics of the finished product...

Most antler or bone I've engraved has needed a good amount of power, but like wood it depends- start low and slow and go and adjust as necessary.

I engraved this with a 4" lens, mostly for the forgiving focus range, and pretty sure I was running at around 60 watts worth...

[Stan Cook]

I am a woodturner and have made and engraved thousands of pens. Antler engraves to a beautiful gray contrast and generally, a wide variety of settings will work. However, the type of pen and finished piece may require more precise settings. If the pen has plenty of "meat" on it, such as a cigar pen and has a smooth, bare surface then almost anything you plug in will work. But if the pen is thin walled (such a a sierra) then you will need to make sure not to burn all the way through (i.e. less power or faster speed). If the pen has a thick film finish (such as CA) then you will need more power or slower speed to penetrate the finish just to get to the antler. Also, avoid any areas where marrow has been exposed. Those areas look awful after they are engraved. On my epilog mini 35watt, I generally use 100 power, 60 speed, 400 dpi and then adjust depending on the pen. For thin walled pens, I will jump to 80 speed, sometimes faster. You can always do a second pass if it comes out too light. For pens with a thick finish, I drop the speed to 40-50 and up the resolution to 600 dpi.