I plan on writing many more articles about different materials that you can cut on the laser engraver machine. Basically with this low powered machine, if you can burn the material with a match, you can cut it with this machine. The problem comes into play with nasty vapors, residues, and dust. PVC and polycarbonate vapors are down right poisonous. You don’t even what to be venting this stuff out to your neighborhood. That said, some laser shops boost their ability to cut polycarbonate! Fiberglass has nasty vapors as well as glass fibers that can mess the precision slides and optics. But cutting it sure comes in handy; you can cut your own circuit boards. Cutting Corian, that is solid surfacing countertop material is really handy. Mostly shops engrave it, then fill it with epoxy. It makes for a beautiful inlay. Again this stuff is nasty because it has bits of rock, grit, glitter, what ever else they toss in there that makes it look so good. All that grit gets into the machine, and you have to clean it more often.
So that said, what does it cut nicely? It’s a long list. There are plastics that are engineered to be cut with lasers. They have bi and tricolor sign plastics that look oh so nice. Acrylic just rocks on the laser. It cuts with a perfect polished edge, and it does so with like no fumes. When acrylic burns it releases CO2 and water. That’s it, plus maybe some modifiers that are in there. A lot of the laser cut-able plastics are a form of modified acrylic.
What else? With success I have tried thin polypropylene, polystyrene, ABS, acetate, rubber (a little nasty), Delron, rubber stamps, matting for picture frames, vinyl, labels, stickers, books, junk mail, wood, 2 by 4′s, veneer, paper, cardboard, chip board, press board, cork, 1/2 inch MDF, Formica, Fabric, and Fig Newtons.
Other materials are made just for engraving such as painted and painted brass and aluminum, and anodized aluminum. They have special engravable label materials; the list goes on and on. It really is a versatile machine. It makes pantographs for good anchors.
laser machine can be process on much material, some of them need you to try.
