Silvertail A0 Laser Cutter/Cutting Parameters

If you experiment with different materials or speeds, please note down all successful settings here,

Cutting

Acrylic (Perspex)

Thickness (mm)	Speed (mm/sec)	Power (%)	Corner Power (%)
2	50	100	80
3	30	100	80
4	20	100	80
5	15	100	80
6	10	100	80
10	5	100	80

Ply (Birch)

Thickness (mm)	Speed (mm/sec)	Power (%)	Corner Power (%)
2	60	100	80
3	55	100	80
6	15	100	80
9	3	100	100

Ply (Poplar)

Thickness (mm)	Speed (mm/sec)	Power (%)	Corner Power (%)
3	60	100	80

MDF

Thickness (mm)	Speed (mm/sec)	Power (%)	Corner Power (%)
3	50	100	80
4	40	100	80
6	15	100	80

Foam board

Thickness (mm)	Speed (mm/sec)	Power (%)	Corner power (%)	Examples / Notes
5	50	25	23	6 passes* for a clean cut with minimal foam shrinkage
5	80	25	23	for a 50% score cut
5	80	20	18	for burning line markers/text into the paper coating

(*) this needs to be retested since we are not supposed to make multiple passes over the same path

Corrugated Cardboard

Thickness (mm)	Speed (mm/sec)	Power (%)	Corner Power (%)
7	100	100	80

Acetate Sheets

Thickness (mm)	Speed (mm/sec)	Power (%)	Corner Power (%)
0.1	100	17	17

Etching

Vary power/speed for different depths

Material	Speed (mm/sec)	Power (%)
Anodized Aluminium	1000	35
Acrylic	800	40
Glass	800	55

Outlining

Material	Speed (mm/sec)	Power (%)	Corner Power (%)
Acrylic	100	30	30
Anodized Aluminium	100	30	30
Ply (light)	100	20	15
Ply (dark)	100	40	35

Other Materials

We start to see issues with the machine when trying to cut with speed higher than 100. To cut thin stencil material it's better to use engrave instead cutting mode.

Material	Speed (mm/sec)	Power (%)	Corner Power (%)
Correx 4mm	30	100	80
engrave coloured mount board 2mm	200	30
Acetate

Kerf

The kerf of 3mm acrylic at normal cutting speeds (35) is between 0.15 - 0.2mm.