Custom 95th Birthday Cake Topper: CNC Laser Engraving & Cutting
CNCROi.com makes lots of custom cake toppers, this 95th Birthday Cake Topper for Chuck is the highest number we’ve done so far!
One of our customers had a relative reaching the ripe old age of 95 and we were honored with designing and creating a custom cake topper just for his birthday.
When I got the specs from the customer, I decided that the best material for this application was 1/4 inch or 6 mm thick MDF. It’s easy to work with, produces fantastic contrast and it’s strong for something of this size which is 12 x 8 inches.
Protective wrapping paper is applied to the surface before any laser work is done, an especially important step for MDF so that no sanding is required after production.
The resins and smoke rest and stain the paper instead of the MDF surface, for something as highly detailed as a custom cake topper, it saves a lot of time using this approach rather than sanding after the fact.
After CNC laser engraving the custom cake topper, the laser does a secondary pass to make the outline of the words and numbers slightly darker. This isn’t necessary, just adds a few more visual details.
The inside parts are cut out before the outside so that every part of the custom cake topper is together as long as possible for ultimate precision.
After all the inside parts are cut, it’s time to CNC laser cut the outside, or the entire custom cake topper from the sheet of MDF from whilst it came.
There is plenty of clearance by the way on this custom cake topper, so CNC laser engraving and cutting a flat sheet or dimensional sheet is no problem for us here at CNCROi.com.
Now that the entire cake topper is cut out, it’s time to review it closely for any defects in either the cutting, material or design. As this is the first one of its kind ever cut out of this sheet of material, this custom cake topper cake out great!
You can see how dirty the white mask is on the MDF, all of that would traditionally have to be sanded which can be tedious and also damage something as fragile as a custom cake topper.
You can see in another light, how the smoke tends to build-up around the laser cut edges with very little around the engraving area, it’s still there, just a lot less material was removed, hence less smoke on this custom cake topper.
Removing the mask reveals a perfect custom cake topper, the bottom part of the “p” still has a little masking but that’s easily removed.
Just didn’t notice this piece of paper in the custom cake topper till after the photos were made. The nice thing about MDF is that it’s an incredibly consistent material and very easy to work with.
Taking a closer look, you can see the very nice texture that’s produced by MDF after it has been precisely laser engraved and cut.
Using the lights from my Austrian industrial wide-format CNC laser, you can see how warm the custom cake toppers looks like when it’s put into a cake.
Here’s another design of a 3 mm or 1/8th thick MDF custom cake topper, the design can be anything!
If you are looking for a custom cake topper for a wedding or other special event, here are some other options to show you what’s possible.
After making this MDF custom cake topper, I decided to make a surprise mirrored acrylic custom cake topper. 95 is the highest number custom cake topper we’ve made thus far and it’s something pretty monumental, so it needs something that’s especially special.
This is the same mirrored acrylic we use for our custom mirror applications. As this is a custom cake topper though, we’ll paint fill it as well, so that it stands out all the more at Chuck’s birthday.
CNC laser engraving this acrylic from the back produces lots of sparks from the vaporisation of the backing while at the same time, engraving into the clear acrylic on the surface, this gives a perfect surface for paint filling.
Just like the custom MDF cake topper produced earlier, the inside parts are cut out before the outside parts. As this is acrylic, it tends to produce a nice flame polished edge which further refracts the light.
Heat also tends to bend acrylic when it’s very thin, in this case, 1/8th or 3 mm thick mirrored acrylic, which isn’t a bad bonus when it comes to cake toppers for a wider viewing angle.
The protective masking is left on the surface though to protect it from the aluminium grid we have on our industrial CNC laser. This custom cake topper mirrored acrylic front would be all scratched-up if it wasn’t for this.
It does look messy though and not very mirror like, but this custom cake topper will look awesome once this protective plastic mask is removed.
Before we do that though, it needs to be custom paint filled, there are lots of elements in here that can be paint filled inside of this custom cake topper but for this, we’ll stick to just two colors.
There are several ways of custom paint filling acrylic mirror and other items, but I’ve found just doing it by hand is quickest and less messy than spray for something of this size and application.
After the paint is allowed to dry, it’s time to remove the surface protective film to reveal both the mirror finish and the effect after paint filling the custom cake topper.
Mirror really makes the whole thing pop, the paint filling providing the perfect surface from which to contrast whatever is being reflected back by this custom cake topper.
Regardless of the environment this custom paint filled cake topper will be found in, it always looks great!
This material can also be inlayed into other materials, so if you wanted a wood backing with mirrored elements, we can do that as well here at CNCROi.com!
Looking for a custom cake topper for any occasion? Birthdays through Anniversaries, Corporate Parties though Weddings, we make them just for you using any material! Contact CNCROi.com right now!
