So, the wife wants me to make drink coasters for the house. I have a CNC, no problem! Then she through a wrench in the plan. She wanted some kind of tile. The parameters she gave is that she didn’t want to have to worry about them getting scratched, or the design coming off if she wiped them down to clean them. Down the proverbial rabbit hole I went. First thought was engraving bits, then I remembered I saw a random video some time ago about using a laser on Tile. After playing around, and more than a few failed attempts, This is what I managed so far, still a prototype if you will.
I was going for the black and white look, but ended up with black, white, and silver. lol.
It won’t wipe off, even with lacquer thinner, and it wont scrape off with a paint scraper, or running the edge of my pocket knife back and forth over it. Not a great test I know, but it’s what I had. lol. If you have any interest in this, look for Norton White Tile method on you tube. The silver color I believe came about from using Krylon Fusion gloss white paint. The local stores have big empty spots where Rust-oleum (the brand most recommend for this), normally would be.
Tools: Onefinity CNC
JTech 7W laser
Software used: Lightburn.
Oh, and no the family name is not Heathen, though it might should be as often as my wife calls me that. I call my little shop Heathen WoodWorks. lol.
@Bob_D Thanks!
The tile is just a basic white tile 4"X4". I picked them up from Lowes. They were $0.15 apiece.
The idea, as I understand it, is that the zinc and or the titanium dioxide in the paint is what reacts with the laser. Basically an etching compound for it. This is just my limited understanding.
The steps that I used are;
Clean tile, I just lacquer thinner. It’s what I have on hand. This cleans of any coating, or oils from handling.
Paint the tile with one even light coat in one direction, rotate 90 degrees and repeat. This is just to make sure I didn’t miss any of the tile.
After paint is dry, laser with chosen settings.
4.I used a little Lacquer thinner to clean all the paint off the tile, then washed in the kitchen sink with dish soap and warm water.
I did find some Rust-oleum cold galvanizing compound in a spray can that has a high zinc amount I am currently playing around with to see how it does, but for the photos I posted that was just Krylon Fusion gloss white.
I would say to make sure you set up a speed/power test in Lightburn with what ever paint you are using before getting started. With that being said, here are the settings that I used with Kyrlon Fusion gloss white that is about a year old. lol.
Filigree = Speed 40 / Power 95%
Floral capital letter = Speed 35 / Power 95%
Lower case lettering = Speed 20 / Power 95%
This process is not fast by any means. At least not at my current, very low, knowledge level. lol.
Hope this helps.
Almost forgot. I did not set this up as a photo. I did a trace image for the filigree, then typed in the font.
I used LINE for the filigree and capital letter. Then, Fill setting for the lower case lettering.
Thank you again sir I will be giving it a shot tomorrow plan on making tile coasters for my pastor’s wife with all her kids names and her dogs appreciate it God bless
I believe thievery is fine as long as you’re honest about it therefore allow me to confess I’ve made two sets of coasters using your settings thank you very much
I have been playing around a bit and found that using the same paint, Rust-o oleum Fusion gloss white, that drying time plays a big part in the outcome of the tile. Tiles that are dry to the touch (about 30 minutes for me where I am) to about 5 hours will leave the silver look in the fill areas. Tiles allowed to dry longer or a full 24 hours come out darker in the fill areas. I imagine that if the settings for the filigree slowed down in might do the same there as well, but honestly I haven’t had the time to play with that yet.
As a note I grabbed the wrong paint today. Kyrlon Fusion Satin white. The letters came out with with a better silver color when they were done. I followed the same dry time for them as before.
If anyone else would like to give something like this a go, I did these last two in Lightbun. For the wolf,
I used the Jarvis setting
Speed = 40
Power = 70
DPI was set at 289.
@OldNewbie This video sent me down a bit of a rabbit hole last night. lol. I had not seen or heard about this. Now that the tile coaster rush is over I’m going to have to give this a go. Thank you!
