FabCafe + LaserEngraving.

[TheNetImp]

Question.

I want to make a Edge Lit LED sign for my wife's car.  Something that I can mount in the back windshield with suction cups to help advertise her business when the car is running.  I've seen the acrylic edge lit kits in Akihabara, but I was unsure how to do the engraving.  I am for lack of better terms artistically challenged.  I can do Illustrator/Photoshop design, but give me a pencil and paper, or a hand held engraver and acrylic, and I am pretty much useless.

I have never used a laser cutter before, and have done a little reading to try and understand what I need.  In the end it seems all I need is vector art of what I want engraved. Am I wrong in assuming this or is there more?

I know Fabcafe offers laser cutting services, but I can't read Japanese and their "english" link links to a blog.  Can someone who's been there explain how to use the service?

Thanks

James

[Akiba]

Yeah, just do your artwork in an Illustrator file or Inkscape (if you don’t have Illustrator). The format they use is CorelDraw. Here are instructions in Japanese on the procedure. You can just use Chrome and hit the translate button if you can’t read Japanese:

http://www.fabcafe.com/menu#flow

 

 You can also get it engraved at Tokyu Hands. There’s a slight benefit to Tokyu Hands since you can get the acrylic there too. I don’t know what they charge for engraving though.

 

Fo

 

Akiba

FreakLabs Open Source Wireless

Web: http://www.freaklabs.org

Shop:http://www.freaklabsstore.com

Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/freaklabs

 

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[James Andrews]

Thanks! Illustrator it is! Any specific Tokyu Hands?

[Torsten Wagner]

They really use CoreDraw format?!

Thats a bit strange since its a closed propertiary format. I would understand SVG or other vector formats.

Or are you saying they use Core Draw and hence all files which can be opend by Corel can be used.

Just interested since I want to use the service in the very near future too.

Totti

[Taylan Ayken]

Recently I just gave them some PDF files to use in raster mode. They had no problems with it. I believe they can handle SVG or DXF files too.

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From: Torsten Wagner <torsten...@gmail.com>
To: "tokyohac...@googlegroups.com" <tokyohac...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Saturday, November 3, 2012 8:38 PM
Subject: Re: [THS:20898] FabCafe + LaserEngraving.

[Luis Felipe RM]

On 11/03/2012 06:06 AM, Taylan Ayken wrote:
> Just interested since I want to use the service in the very near future too.

you can create your design files using Inkscape, and give to them in SVG
format.

make sure to read this before you go:

http://www.atxhackerspace.org/wiki/Using_Inkscape_with_the_Laser_Cutter

[MRE]

Philipe had some serious issues with giving them inkscape files.
Illustrator or CorelDraw (I use CD works great).

So, some advice on using FabCafe:

1: the laser works by way of colors. Try to choose "standard" colors (red, green, blue, etc.. not unnamed colors in the color picker).
Each color represents what you want to do. Say for example Red = cut, Blue = 25% power engrave, Green = 50% power engrave.

2: Raster engraving takes MUCH longer than cutting. So, be prepared to pay for a double block of time. By the way, its 2000 yen for 30 minutes.

3: Text import USUALLY has font issues. They get converted to one of the few fonts they have available. So, convert all text to paths if you want to be sure nothing goes FUBAR

4. You absolutely need to bring material with you. Go to Tokyu Hands first to get your materials.

5: You will need a usb stick to transfer your files to them

6: You will need to call ahead and reserve a time, especially on weekends. But, many of the staff speak broken English. Just give it a try, you will be surprised at how easy it is.

[Romedius Weiss]

As it turned out, we had some problems with the Inkscape files:
All the design files we gave them got shrinked a bit in a "magical" way. Nothing fitted anymore. So we basically lost some material, and more important: precious time.

We can try to import the files into Coreldraw on Tuesday and prepare them for Lasercutting there

On the positive side: This Project will turn into a international Project next week. Philipe will work on it from Noisebridge, I will work from Innsbruck (IT-Syndikat) and I'm sure that someone will lead the uphill battle in THS (hint ;-) ). (yes, I'm one of these always positive thinking bastards :-P )

We will put the Designfiles on Github and share it with you.

See you on Tuesday,
Romedius

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[Luis Felipe RM]

well said,

this is for Torsten and other people using Inkscape and planning to use
Fabcafe services:

- we generated the files (me and Romedius); I printed on a paper to make
sure our measurements were correct (they were!), but they were imported
in a crazy funky way by adobe illustratorz and other software they use
there. Result: our design was all messed up, there was no way to put it
together.

On a happier note: they are super nice, patient, and helpful at Fabcafe
and did not charge us for the file importing mistakes (we just lost our
acrylic sheets); we spent almost 2 hours there, exporting the design
files to all the supported formats of Inkscape and trying them out (pdf,
eps, windows metafile, dgk, etc.)

I will stop typing because this is too much drama for a Sunday night.

So, now you know, fuck the (proprietary) world.

[Taylan Ayken]

I've heard a couple of times that you have to be careful while importing/exporting in Inkscape and some other programs.

Once I did some mistake during exporting on Solidworks and results were cutting the part 4x the size, the UBER CASE! :D

I will lead the battle using my university machine shop. Have to figure out my new usage rights and some other stuff. Also I have to cut 2 raspberry pi cases for Felipe and another friend. Have a few stuff I have to design too (tight tolerance trials).

And a reminder for all: I can use the laser cutter at school for free for 3 hrs, I just have to reserve it beforehand. If you have sth that needs to be cut, I can do that for you as long as you give me the design files and the material as 3 hours is more than I usually need during my cutting process, I usually prepare everything beforehand and get done in an hour. The catch is I will just cut the files you gave me, I will not adjust them for tight fit tolerances and laser kerf and so on. And you will not be able to see the results and do the next trial immediately.

---

From: Romedius Weiss <romediu...@gmail.com>
To: tokyohac...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Monday, November 5, 2012 1:47 AM
Subject: Re: [THS:20952] FabCafe + LaserEngraving.

[James Andrews]

Thank you! The colors for engraving vs cutting very much appreciated.
As for materials, there are edge lit engraving kits in Akihabara.
I'll probably just grab one of them comes with the acrylic, LEDS,
mounting equipment etc. As for reservations, my wife speaks Japanese
;-)

James

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[James Andrews]

A have Illustrator, so for me Inkscape won't even be in the mix.
Hopefully it being an older version of illustrator (CS3) won't be a
problem.

James

[Torsten Wagner]

uhhh I was not planned to use inkscape.

Almost everything I do, I do in a programming way ;)

TikZ, gnuplot, matplotlib, OpenScad.... 

My point was more, that the laser cutters are unlikely process a Corel Draw files. 

They will use a standard generic format. Postscript, HPGL, HP-GL/2 resp. PLT  or whatever.

It would be much more useful to know what is this format and whether fabcafe accept this formats directly.

E.g. CAD programs can directly create a plot job and generate a PLT file. This can be send to the plotter directly without

any further data manipulation. It might require to install the drivers and I am not sure they are available. However, it would

be the best way to make sure the stuff comes out 100% as you designed it. This procedure would be equivalent compared to generating Gerber files for a PCB fab.

Just find the business idea to ask people to use Corel Draw and hence making my own business dependent on a proprietary software which only a very low number of people have access too a bit scary.

Totti

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[Luis Felipe RM]

On 11/04/2012 04:57 PM, Torsten Wagner wrote:
> They will use a standard generic format. Postscript, HPGL, HP-GL/2 resp.
> PLT or whatever.

we tried eps and ps, and got no love.

> Just find the business idea to ask people to use Corel Draw and hence
> making my own business dependent on a proprietary software which only a
> very low number of people have access too a bit scary.

piracy (i.e. attacking ships) is always something to take into account
when proprietary software and vendor lock-in are the subjects of a
discussion :-)