laser engraving fabrics

[laserhut]

hi guys just wondering if anybody has tried engraving on any fabrics and what their results were like, we have engraved denim its fantastic, a fleece jacket which looked awesome and still felt fluffy on the engraved area's and also leather car headrests which look fantastic, want to try others so anybody who has tried anything else and has any pointers or power settings please drop me a line especially for vinyl leatherette.
thanks col

[David]

Hi Col
Received wisdom is that vinyl should not be laser cut / engraved! Apparently vinyl chloride monomer is extremely aggressive and will degrade lens surfaces and anything else it comes into contact with, including people - this leads to disapproval and complaints, even in comprehensive schools.

We’ve had some success engraving fleece, velvet, and various denims, and cutting rayon / polyester fabric where the laser cut also heat welds the material thus avoiding problems with frayed edges.

As an alternative to vinyl leatherette I would suggest sticking to leather. As well as engraving and cutting out, evenly spaced laser cut holes in leather allow hand sewing with apparently machine precision, making detailed leatherwork a possibility at school level – something that both Art and D&T Textiles have made use of in coursework.

Hope this is of some use

[bob]

Hi Col we have a 6090 and manage to cut most fabrics like spandex and elasticated at speed 20 and power 30%
We have also engraved and cut felt really sucessfully.
Cotton is good as it leaves a really good contrasting brown pattern.
Denim good till I washed it we got a good effect at firs then washed it it fell apart Then tried again on alot lower power and this worked really well.
The friend of Chris who has the mish mash Jeans factory does denim -the fade marks on laser and he got it upto a scan gap of 1mm asn still got the required effect and does patterns really fast !!!
Have fun try anything once start on low power if theyre your best jeans!!

[laserhut]

thanks everybody for the replies especially david for the hint on vinyl cutting or engraving, i knew it wasn't safe to cut pvc but never thought the same would apply to vinyl but obvious really so thanks for saving a lung dave lol.