Well I pretty much had every other woodworking tool from sawmill to CNC, so i figured it would just be a matter of time before I got around to ordering this one. Pulled the trigger today and ordered an Epilog Mini 18 Laser Engraver/Cutter.
It is amazing what this little powerhouse can do. You can engrave or cut wood, marble, bricks, stone, plastics, glass and hundreds of other material. Very simple to use and almost like using a printer. Open Coreldraw, pick your image, add your text, size it to fit the blank you want to etch or cut, select power level for laser and push the send button. In a matter of minutes, the image is engraved in your substrate.
We will be using this to offer our customer base a new level of product customization and a whole host of advertising specialties to help them promote their business, such as pocket knives they can give out with their company logo engraved in the handles or even custom champagne glasses for weddings or othe such special events like car shows.
Ordered it with rotary attachment which lets you engrave cylindrical shaped objects like glasses, wine bottles, mag light flashlights and especially our pizza cutter and ice cream scoop handles and wine stoppers. Even got the photo engraving software that allows you to take pictures and convert them to engravings.
Unit will be at dealers first week in December and Mrs. Beaver and I go for a days worth of training. In the mean time, re-arranging a corner of the garage for it and installing some support items like exhaust blower and air lines that it needs.
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/21313/legend_mini18_topper_04.jpg)
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/21313/rotaryattachment.jpg)
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/21313/plp3.jpg)
Wowser Beaver, Santa will have nothing for you this year 'cause you got it all !!! Congrats for sure. :)
Now this is a good idea. It really is. smiley_thumbsup
So that's how that is done.
Those are some neat looking samples there, BBL. I can see your sales figures going up again.
I had always wondered how that was done, now I know.
Man that is sweet. I have lusted after one for years. Currently send all of my pens to a man in FL for engraving. I am envious to say the least and hope you keep us up to date on how it goes in reality. Congratulations you two.
Whats the price tag on one of those? I would be very interested in adding it to the dream shop. Oh that reminds me, gotta go play PowerBall to get that dream shop ;)
Epilog is the cadillac and I would guess ten thousand. ???
Thanks all for the kind words. Very excited to get our hands on this. Have been talking about getting one for about two years between wife and I.
Kilgrosh, Farmerjw's guess was close but a bit light for this model. You can get into the smallest epilog zing for about $9,000, but it does not accept the rotary option which we definitely wanted. The next unit up is the larger size Zing at $12,000.
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Then you jump to the elite series, which is built better and much faster. This particular unit will wind up costing me about $13,000 by the time I add all the needed support equipment and $600 worth of high end software to drive it.
Do not be tempted to buy one of the cheap China made units. You will just be throwing your money away
BusyBeaver, just realized/noticed you are in Fort Wayne, IN! I am East of you, ever been to Toto? Mark Bailey's Discount store? That is my neck of the woods, North Judson, IN. Anyway, last year I went to a woodworking school in Indiana, Marc Adams, it is South of Indy, Whiteland I think is the address. Anyway, he actually has a class this August in laser and cutting and he has an Epilogue. Here is a link to that specific class for this year. http://www.marcadams.com/available-classes/weekend-workshop/1253/?back=classes
He is a good guy to talk with and won't lead you astray. Good luck, would love to see your set up someday.
JW
BBL, Thanks for the info. I'm always interested in the new ways that others have expanded their business and if its a possibility for myself in the future. Honestly, I might have a project for you to complete for me when you get set up. When you're up and running, please let me know and we can talk further.
Quote from: Farmerjw on November 18, 2013, 09:06:09 PM
BusyBeaver, just realized/noticed you are in Fort Wayne, IN! I am East of you, ever been to Toto?
So Toto is not in Kansas anymore? ;) :D :D
Yeah, I know its corny, but it made me laugh
Kilgrosh
Will definitely let you know when we are up and running with the laser. Wife is very excited to get her hands on this machine. Don't think it will be long before she masters it.
So far as finding new sources of income for your business, i love to help people do that and help them flourish. A while back I offered a lot of advice about firewood bundling in the hopes that others would benefit from it. I feel like the Lord has blessed me and Mrs. Beaver with all that he has provided and allows us to enjoy a very comfortable and enjoyable life. There is lots of fruit on the trees and we like helping other get their share to eat as well. Never been much into COMPETITION where you try to steel business from the other fellow and take food off his plate, always been more in favor of COOPERATION where you work with one another and both prosper and eat well at the end of the day. Having said that, if there is anything I can help you with, please do not hesitate to ask.
I don't saw volume like many of the other members on the forum. God bless them, they have a much stronger back than I do to keep up that pace. I saw a very limited amount of logs and do so in spurts. Right now I have 9 Basswood logs to cut up and 4 walnut logs waiting on the mill. Much of the wood we saw gets used in our own production and items where we add additional value by turning them into finished products which we offer for resale such as the ones show below
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/21313/our_cnc_pictures_001%7E2.jpg)
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/21313/two_stoppers.JPG)
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/21313/stabilized_pens.jpg)
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/21313/table_pic_2.jpg)
Looks great BBL, and thanks for the offer. I will take you up on it when I get my own operation off the ground.
BBL, I don't know how you are handling it. I check this thread daily in the hopes it came in early and you posted some work from it!
Farmerjw
Laser is in Valpo now. We are going to go to blue chip casino either Monday afternoon, have some fun, stay at the casino in a free room they comped us, then take the short ride to Valpo tuesday morning for a day of training and take the unit home. All other support items like exhaust blower and air compressor are in place and lots of scrap wood to practice on. I have some huge plans for this new machine.
Have never been to Toto, but been to Michigan City , Valpo and Merriville area many times. Would love to get together and meet you. Maybe i can get you to send them pen engraving my way instead of all the way to florida. Mrs. Beaver turns a ton of pens and we are also a pen state industries authorized dealer. Have you tried the 50 cal bullet pens? They are a huge seller. Between October 5 to now, we have sold over 400 of them. Had one customer alone buy 100 for resale in his store.
If you have time, let me know and perhaps we can get together and meet one another.
In three weeks I start Christmas vacation. That would be a great time to plan a meeting. Valpo is South of me, about 45 minutes. That'll give you time to get it up and running. You or Mrs. ever run a Beall Pen Wizard? I demonstrated mine at the Midwest pen gathering a few years back that was sponsored by the online forum, The Pen Shop. Look forward to meeting up and hope you have a great time.
FarmerJW
Laser is here, software is all configured. Now just installing a new cabinet and countertop for it, the air lines, and the 4" exhaust vent qnd dust collector blower system. Will take me a few days to get everything just right because of a few other commitments like dentist cleaning and other such life events. Will post pics when everything is in place. The folks at Fairway Laser were fantastic to deal with and we took a day of training there yesterday which was awesome. The more they showed us what it could do, the more ideas for putting it to you we got. Working on a bunch of ideas now on how to use the mill to cut lumber, use the cnc to machine certain types of blanks, and use the laser engraver to engrave them. Even talked to Laser company about getting into their catalog as a source for laser engravable blanks. That could be a huge market for us.
Would love to have you come pay me a visit. Will even treat you to lunch. 8)
LUNCH,I'm on my way. :D Looking forward to seeing pictures.
I gots to have something engraved. ;D
With the kind of toys you have, who has time for lunch???????!!!!!!!!? ;D
From your mill, do you happen to have a pile of half rounds/slabs? Under a roof? I am looking for some that would be drawer front sizes. If so, just another reason to get over there and buy some wood. Good luck on the install and look forward to meeting you in person.
In your second pic just above the pens, are those stoppers for wine bottles? Sorry for my ignorance but would love to order a few with a little engraving on them for Christmas gifts.
Quote from: Farmerjw on December 04, 2013, 10:30:36 PM
With the kind of toys you have, who has time for lunch???????!!!!!!!!? ;D
From your mill, do you happen to have a pile of half rounds/slabs? Under a roof? I am looking for some that would be drawer front sizes. If so, just another reason to get over there and buy some wood. Good luck on the install and look forward to meeting you in person.
Flitches dont lay around my shop long. We cut them to 16 inches in length and sell them as bundled firewood to get rid of them quick
I have 10 basswood logs in the building under roof that I plan on milling in the next week or so. Will have the flitches from them.
Quote from: sandhills on December 05, 2013, 02:08:55 PM
In your second pic just above the pens, are those stoppers for wine bottles? Sorry for my ignorance but would love to order a few with a little engraving on them for Christmas gifts.
Yes those are indeed wine stoppers that Mrs. Beaver turns. Once we get the machine on line, we do plan on offering stoppers engraved, in fact that is something we plan to offer up big time as there is a nice winery that does a heck of a business less than 5 miles from our house.
Flitches dont lay around my shop long. We cut them to 16 inches in length and sell them as bundled firewood to get rid of them quick
I have 10 basswood logs in the building under roof that I plan on milling in the next week or so. Will have the flitches from them.
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PM sent concerning the flitches. While doing some searching on the "look" of basswood I ran across this site, https://basswoodman.com/
and thought you and your wife may enjoy and get ideas from this site for your new endeavor of the laser engraver.
Look forward to meeting you soon. Have a load of hay coming in this Saturday so am a couple of weeks out yet for getting over there.
He is basically selling it for $5 a board foot. I would jump for joy if I get $5 a bf for these logs when i get them cut up because I think i have about 1200 bf of it.
New Epilog Laser is installed and up and running. All vented outside the house and hooked up to its own air compressor as well. Installed new cabinet and counter top for it in the wife's work shop. Exhaust blower and small air compressor are in cabinet below laser engraver. Nice and neat and orderly. Countertop area to right of machine is for laptop that will run the laser.
I imagine Mrs. Beaver will be running the machine most of the time. Went to store and picked up a bunch of inexpensive glasses ( wine, champagne, ect) to practice on with rotary axis as well since we can now offer glass engraving as well.
Ordered about $4000 worth of blank product that we can laser engrave on to get us up and running. Orders should be here Christmas week. Mrs. Beaver is very excited to get going with this machine.
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/21313/signs_015.jpg)
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/21313/signs_014.jpg)
Man that is looking good!! Sometime between Christmas and New Year's hope to get a chance to meet you and Mrs. BB. Will pm you later today. Man that is a sweet set up. Okay, pictures of something you have run so far please!
I am looking forward to seeing these wine glass demos. Also, I owe you a phone call. I'll reach out after the New Year. Best of luck in running the new gear!
Laser Engraver is up and running and I finally learned enough CorelDraw to be dangerous.
Mrs. Beaver and I engraved this a few minutes ago into some thin cherry we had laying around. Learning a lot about how the print driver for the laser deals with colors. If you could physically feel the sample you would find that where the image on the screen was a darker color, the laser engraved darker and deeper into the wood. For instance the shirt on the rabbit was A rather dark red and is somewhat deeper than say the lighter color area on the feet which was sort of beige in color in the image. Did the " F & K Designs" and Phone number in bold and got real good penetration into the cherry. There is no defect in the engraving in the small "a" in Kristina. There was actually a small knot in the wood in that area.
I am very satisfied with the outcome and cant wait to do more. Sorry for crummy image. Took with cell phone camera. Looks much better than what image shows.
(https://forestryforum.com/gallery/albums/userpics/21313/Fnk_Deigns_Bunny_in_cherry.jpg)
Nice investment, er tool you purchased. ;)
Does it just engrave, or can it also cut out stuff?
Super cool, BTW. 8) 8) 8) 8) 8) 8) 8)
I think that "crummy image" is awesome. smiley_thumbsup
WOW!!!!
Very nice indeed.
The shop where I worked had one and made jigs so they could do multiple parts at a time that would work great for your pens and bottle stoppers.
I know nothing about the things, but they could cut plexi glass for displays and jigs plus cardboard for making boxes.
Allan
Thanks for the praise Guys.
This image is 5 inches wide and 3 inches tall. It took just over a minute to engrave it. That image is done in 400 DPI ( Dots per Inch ) resolution. I can go as low as 75 DPI or as High as 1200 DPI. At 75 DPI it would have probably been done engraving in about 30 seconds, at 1200 DPI probably closer to 3 min.
That laser head moves super fast. Wife put a video of it cutting on our facebook page. Will post link down the road.
To those that asked, yes it will cut at well up to about 1/4 thick material. The head moves at a slower speed and you turn the power all the way up when cutting.
A friend of mine cut out router templates in 1/8" material using a similar machine when I was doing an inlay on a desk. He made 5 -- nominal, +.005", +.010", -.005", and -.010", starting with the inlay itself, and then adding router guide dimensions. Man was that think accurate and made a near-perfect inlay!
Cool toy!! Sorry ... investment!!
A machine like this could really simplify marquetry. Seems like eventually you could do full carvings with this technology. Will it cut steel?
SawyerBrown
You can actually cut the pocket and cut the insert using the laser. There is a video on youtube showing an Epilog laser doing a star cutout and a star insert.
For the area to be cutout, you do an inside the line cut, for the insert, you do an outside the line cut. The two pieces then fit together perfectly. There is also some examples on epilogs website of someone doing a script writing corian insert into a piece of solid oak that looks just awesome
Mesquite - you can in fact do full relief carving with the laser. The unit i have will not cut steel. You need one with about 10 times the power of this one to do that and at about 10 times the cost as well.
Aw, nice! 8) I know where to go next time!