Ralphrob48

One week to go, exhibition guides all printed and ready, you can preview it here: https://www.mmrs.co.uk/ Advance ticket holders can get in at 0945, walk-ups at 1030. Advance tickets available here: https://www.mmrs.co.uk/exhibition/tickets2023/ A great set of layouts lined up, hope to see you all there. Ralph

I have a Darkly Labs Emblaser 2 running Lightburn and I have been using this combination for a few years now. I 2D draw with Coreldraw and save in an SVG format directly into Lightburn using several colours so I can order the sequence in which i can control the cuts myself. Line thicknesses doesn't make any difference because the laser beam is a standard width and it will always cut to that width regardless of your drawing line thickness. If you want a wider line you will need to have 2 or more separate lines next to each other to make the desired width you want. Lightburn will also happily import PDF files, I have done this in the past but prefer SVG. Hope this helps. Ralph

Here is a nice clip of the layouts at the show: Manchester 2022 layout video

Not long now! Looking forward to it.

Stove R on E Lancs Railway, photos taken January 2013 of the recently restored vehicle which may be of use to you.

Some photos there that remind me of my younger days. Partington Coaling Basin was my regular bike ride and often went there seeing the ships being loaded with wagon after wagon of coal. Really interesting watching wagons being tipped into the hold of ships. Good to see photos of some of the MSC wagons. Just wish we had digital cameras in those days. The only photos I have of that area at that time are of ships sadly, Ralph

For excellent waterslide transfers you need to contact John Peck at Precision Decals http://www.precisionlabels.com/ Great service, good price and good quality transfers made form your own artwork. A plus point is that John has a printer that can print white. Well worth the money and I have used his service many times over the last few years. I would never bother trying to print my own any more, a satisfied customer. Ralph

Simon, CO lasers are far more suited to MDF, they have the power to cut in a single pass. Justin, I apply shellac after cutting. It is available in many names, shellac varnish, button polish and sanding sealer. I get mine from Ebay and usually get 1 litre for around £15 or so and it lasts forever. Lamination will cause warping which is why I use a framework and glue to that using strong clamps for the glue to dry. Gorilla glue is the preferred adhesive for that and it removes the warp perfectly. Hope this helps. Ralph

Hi Pat, That looks very nice. As an Emblaser 2 user for a couple of years now I have had a lot of experience using this machine and if you look on this thread here I have posted some more information about the materials and techniques I use with mine which you might find useful. Cereal packet cardboard, whilst useful for checking things out, is far too much of a poor quality to be of much use, it is worth getting some decent card from a hobbyshop but make sure it is not white! Read the thread for more information. I have also posted on the Darkly Labs forums in the past, look for threads about 1 year with an Emblaser for a railway modeller. You can achieve amazing results with an Emblaser and card and shellac or sanding sealer. My thread on the Scalefour forum https://www.scalefour.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=5848&start=100shows the sort of things you can achieve using your machine and card in many layers. MDF is difficult to cut and I never use it unless there is no alternative, get some decent card and you will produce excellent models. Ralph

Those photos are of 4mm models. The bottom one is a mockup of part of the big mill I made using the laser. There are around 100 separate card parts on that sample, the mill itself has a few thousand all made possible by the laser. I never post here as you might have realised but if you are interested take a look at the Scalefour forum and search for Alpha Mill. Engraving bricks requires a bit of trial and error. You need to get your cut settings right, I always engrave horizontals first and then the verticals, they are different colours on the drawing. Then pick a low intensity with a reasonably high speed and vary the 2 settings until you get the depth and quality you are looking for. In my view model brickwork is usually far too deep and you are only looking for a suggestion of mortar, in the real thing mortar is virtually flush with the brickwork. Plastic sheet brickwork is just wrong but then I am a P4 modeller. The kerf on the Emblaser is about 0.2mm and you can't get a wider cut than that unless you use 2 or more line widths. You can get the suggestion of wider lines by deepening your cut but you will soon find what works for you. Taking photos of stonework and converting that into a bitmap which can then be engraved can be done. We have successfully engraved large sections of stonework and setts and by using resin casting you can use both laser engraving and resin casting to make viaducts, bridges etc. This picture is from one of my tests showing a sample which has been painted using a Vallejo grey primer and MIG washes to get the colour. Also the settings I used to achieve that result are noted. We actually took some photos of stones in the wall outside our clubrooms and by using those photos built up a montage which could be stitched together to represent a bigger size wall. You can get some good pictures of stonework and brickwork on Shutterstock. Screen grabbing works quite well in picking up a few stones which can then be put into a bigger picture. Poplar ply is available from SLEC https://www.slecuk.com/poplar-ply/30mm-18quot-poplar-ply-bbb and I always use 1/8th, the other thicknesses are too much work in the laser. If you want thicker, double up., that's what I do with everything from the laser. If I can't cut it with a Stanley knife easily it won't cut easily with the laser so I don't use it that's why I never use MDF, it is a very hard material, poplar ply is much easier. I have never tried Rowmark plastic sheet, the cost for me would have been astronomical when you work out the cost per small sheet. Hope this helps you on your journey. Ralph

Hi Justin, Reading your experiences with this low cost laser cutter I thought you might be interested in reading my experiences of using a laser cutter, it might save you a bit of time. I too started with a Silhouette and soon kicked that into touch. I now have a Darkly Labs Emblaser which is a low powered laser cutter and it took me a while to find the right methods that work for me. I eventually settled on using card as the prime medium for what I needed but I do use ply too from time to time. One thing you mention is white card, it took me quite some time to work out that this colour isn't really suitable as it sometimes cuts cleanly but more often than not it doesn't. It really depends upon how bright the white is, this seems to be the limiting factor. You think you are doing yourself a favour buying a good quality white card and then spend a long time going round in circles wondering why it doesn't cut cleanly. The materials I regularly use now are thin card, 0.2mm thick, this is standard office card. Don't use white, go for a card with a buff or yellowish tint, light green works but avoid blue. Grey is the colour I have standardised on. I also buy 0.5mm card which I get from Hobby craft among other places. I always buy grey card in this thickness. For thicker card I use 1.5mm mounting board as used by picture framers. This is readily available in Hobbycraft, The Range, B&M etc. It is relatively cheap, £3 or so for an A1 sheet and cuts easily. In the past I have used the mounting board which is black one side and white the other and I have used the white side but the last batch I got was brighter than the previous batch which meant that the laser wouldn't cut the white side which meant I couldn't use it. I used to buy 20 A1 sheets at a time from Rapid Online but because of the change in brightness these days I get it from Hobbycraft who sell Daler Rowney card (the best in my experience) and I always get a grey colour or a light straw colour, if I can use the white side I do otherwise I can use the coloured side. For really thick material I use poplar ply. This is a lot softer than birch ply but has the same stiffness. The ply has to go through with 2 passes but all the other materials cut cleanly with one pass. I use laminations of the material to build up to the thickness I need. I have been using Lightburn for a long time now, it is a great piece of software and in your drawing package you need to select colours as the vehicle for changing the cutting properties in Lightburn. I never use the drawing features in Lightburn preferring to use Coreldraw which I have used for over 10 years so it is second nature to me. Having a laser cutter changes the way you make things totally. The pictures below show the sort of things I have made using ply and card as mentioned above, find something that works for you and your machine and enjoy your modelling.