Cutting 1/8" (3mm) acrylic with 80 Watt, power and speed suggestions

So I finally have my x1390. Laser Engraving Machine - Low cost Laser Engraving Equipment System by Redsail

A few questions.

1. I'm using it to cut shapes out of acrylic, 1/8" x 32"x48" sheets. I'm just curious as to general power and speed settings to cut this acrylic. I've obviously played around with it and cuts decent, but I'm not sure what I should be looking for. Right now it seems like I need 80% power at a fairly slow speed to cut well.

2. What is the recommended distance from the material should the laser sit. Right now its 15mm as recommended by the manufacturer, but seems high to me?

3. This machine does not have a Z-Axis; trade off for getting a large machine for a good price. I need to shim the acrylic sheet up about 1" Just been messing around and have used wood temporarily. Would it be worth while to cover the wood with a thin sheet of aluminum or something so the wood isn't consistently burning

eighth inch is about 3mm

3mm acrylic will cut *beautifully* at 7 mm/sec and 30 watts on my machine with a 4" lens

80% of 80 watts = 64 watts, so something *horrendously* wrong there, I cut 25 mm acrylic with 40/45 watts

here is a vid of 3mm acrylic cutting

https://vimeo.com/107906791

I have a lot of surface area to cover; i'm not super worried about the looks of the sides. I was previously using a router without any kind of finishing.


I'm really new to lasers, Would it be bad to cut at like 100% power to find the maximum speed?

for our machine, if you use 80 watt laser tube, we suggest 15mm/s 60% power.
and you can check the parameter from our website, download the data from our website directly, maybe it is useful to you.:violin:
download - Thunderlaser

What is the best cutting wattage and speed for cutting 12" vinyl records with the thickness 2mm ? 60 watt speed with 10mm speed ?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by vinyl1968

What is the best cutting wattage and speed for cutting 12" vinyl records with the thickness 2mm ? 60 watt speed with 10mm speed ?

---

You don't vinyl records contain PVC that is a no no to cut with a laser

I do my engravings at 45% power & 300mms on my 50 watt tube. It engraves about 1/2mm deep at these settings(which is too deep for what you want), just to give you an idea. I cut at 60% power & 6mms for a nice refined edge with a 1.5" lense(Focal point) with the convex side up at 4.5mm from nozzle tip to the acrylic workpiece. I do not reccomend using PVC for the obvious reason. Get black acrylic. Hope this was helpful.https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...1162df6b3c.jpg

Sent from my SM-G935F using Tapatalk