Engrave Stainless Yeti
Engrave Stainless Yeti
For years I have sandblasted mugs ( non coated ) and then a few years ago my best customer gave me two cases of powder coated mugs to do, wow what an adventure, my production time went from 5 min. a mug to 45 min a mug because that powder coat is hard as a coffin nail! I have to increase my mask thickness and increase my blast pressure and grit size just to get through. So I think I wold like to add a 4th axis to my cnc and do the next batch with it if it's more economical. At least I can do other stuff with the cnc is working. I guess my questions are should I do drag or rotary engraving and if I can do rotary what bit would be a good choice? I am not opposed to changing the logo to match the machining process. Here is a pic of what I have been doing.
- TReischl
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Re: Engrave Stainless Yeti
You are going to need some seriously good tooling on the rotary axis. With that type of work the bottle has to be concentric with the centerline of the rotary.
I would not be worrying about which bits or a dragknife at this point. More like:what can I chuck it in that will give me deadly accurate concentricity? What to use on the tailstock to support the end. How do I get the rotary lined up and leveled out.
I would not be worrying about which bits or a dragknife at this point. More like:what can I chuck it in that will give me deadly accurate concentricity? What to use on the tailstock to support the end. How do I get the rotary lined up and leveled out.
"If you see a good fight, get in it." Dr. Vernon Johns
- Rcnewcomb
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Re: Engrave Stainless Yeti
Have you considered a laser? ->Powder-Coated Stainless Steel Water Bottle Engraved with an Epilog Laser System
- Randall Newcomb
10 fingers in, 10 fingers out, another good day in the shop
10 fingers in, 10 fingers out, another good day in the shop
Re: Engrave Stainless Yeti
I have considered a laser many times lol. Just trying to make due with the considerable investment I have in CNC router equipment but just from the searches I have done seems like it's not practical to do what I want with just a cnc router. I have been considering an endurance laser add on http://endurancelasers.com/ for some time but have no experience with diode lasers, seems like it wold do the job I think. My main problem is shop space, the 4x4 cnc takes up just about 75 percent of the space and the sandblaster station takes up the rest. As far as holding a mug in a 4th axis, I saw a video of a fellow who had the base of the mug in the three jaw side of the 4th axis and on the open end of the mug he had a wood blank with rubber feet that fit inside and would keep the mug supported. He was doing beer mugs with a diamond drag bit, It worked great but seemed slow and a little cumbersome ( think it was a shopbot ) and for glass mugs sandblasting is far superior I think in quality to laser or diamond drag.
Thanks for responding
Thanks for responding
- TReischl
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Re: Engrave Stainless Yeti
It looks to me like you built your own cnc router? Since you have done that you should be able to mount a laser near your router spindle. Figure out the offsets and all should work pretty darn good. I have no idea what power you need to remove the powder coating, maybe someone will chime in with that information. That should be downright inexpensive.
I added a 2.5W laser to my set up exactly that way and it works great.
I added a 2.5W laser to my set up exactly that way and it works great.
"If you see a good fight, get in it." Dr. Vernon Johns
Re: Engrave Stainless Yeti
yes, I built a 4x4 Joe's cnc. But can't really say it was that hard, Joe's forum and kit made it as easy as a model car to put together well minus the welded base and wiring. I will try and chat with George tomorrow and ask if anyone has tested his laser on powder coating.
- gkas
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Re: Engrave Stainless Yeti
Here is a sample of stuff I've been playing with. I recently added a 4.2W laser from Axiom to my Axiom CNC. The laser is actually made by Jtech Photonics http://jtechphotonics.com/. I use mine for wood marking (logo) and cutting thin poster board and felt.
This is a credit card size anodized aluminum blank I got from my son. The numbers are inches/min. The first example was run twice. I'm guessing you would need at least a 50W laser to remove the anodizing.
This is a credit card size anodized aluminum blank I got from my son. The numbers are inches/min. The first example was run twice. I'm guessing you would need at least a 50W laser to remove the anodizing.
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- Vectric Craftsman
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Re: Engrave Stainless Yeti
This is pretty easy on a laser, the chicom lasers are glass CO2 Direct Current tubes, whereas the US machines are Radio Frequency metal tubes [5 times the cost]. We have a couple of people on our chinese laser forum [RDworkslab dot com] who are building DIY lasers. It is basically a cnc motion machine with a laser tube that bounces off 3 mirrors and thru a lens to focus. Power is normally between 50 and 150 watts and machine sizes really vary of course. I have been obsessed with mine for three years and know a fair bit.