Firefighting Plaque: Laser Engraved Acadia Wood
CNCROi.com made a custom firefighting plaque using our CNC laser to engrave the logo permanently onto Acadia hardwood.
Firefighing is a really awesome unique profession and we get the honor to make custom plaques and other custom items for firefighters on a regular basis.
For this custom firefighting plaque, Acadia was chosen as the material of choice, it’s incredibly strong, provides wonderful laser engraved contrast and has a substantial weight to it.
Just to give you an idea, the same material, different design for a custom Acadia wooden plaque.
As the laser engraving process doesn’t add any substance, such as paint or stain to the wood unnaturally, only the charcoal of the wood itself is what produces the contrast.
As a result, this laser engraving on Acadia for this firefighting plaque will never fade, crack or peel over time, it’s completely permanent and because it’s wood, the surface can be refreshed many years from now to give it a brand new look.
If you are wondering what a solid surface Corian plaque would look like, here’s a great video for you.
As this is a vector logo, everything comes out sharp and highly detailed on the Acadia hardwood, if it was a bitmap, then you’d have jagged edges and a little bit of a blur along the edges.
This custom firefighting plaque was actually laser engraved 3 times at CNCROi.com, the first is to break the surface and create a little depth, the second pass adds a bit more depth and some charcoal and the third is straight charcoal production to create the contrast you see on the surface of the wood.
When it comes to the color produced, it’s the natural color of the wood, if you wanted it to have other colors like red, green, blue and so forth, then CNCROi.com would have to paint fill it but I think for a custom firefighting plaque such as this, “natural” is the best way forward.
The bright light you see is the instant vaporization of the wood surface under the intense power of the CO2 laser, resins, glues, wood fibers… literally up in smoke.
Metal is a wonderful material for custom plaques as well, it’s a different production process but equally as rewarding to produce.
Unlike the metal and plastic work we do at CNCROi.com, when ever I do woodworking, the shop smells wonderful, I almost feel bad wasting the smoke from there by sending them outdoors.
With CNCROi.com, if you wanted a custom firefighting plaque made out of another species such as Maple, Oak, Bloodwood or whatever your preference is, that’s no problem, we work with them all in the shop for a variety of applications.
CNCROi.com has been making custom plaques for years, here’s an example of a live edge wooden plaque we made a few years back.
When it comes to your design preferences, we are equally as flexible, if you want a custom firefighting plaque with your city on it, a different IAFF designation, even a unique shape if your fire hall wants something different than what I show here, no problem.
When it comes to materials, your options are also endless for your firefighting plaque, plastics such as acrylic to bullet proof polycarbonate glass, metals from stainless steel to titanium, we can even make these custom plaques out of solid surface material such as Corian!
With endless options to customize your firefighting plaque, we also offer any sizing you want, so if you wanted something at the front entrance that was a few feet in diameter, no problem on that front either and yes, you can also mix and match materials at CNCROi.com!
Your custom wooden plaque also doesn’t need to be square or rectangular, CNCROi.com can cut out an outline to any shape or size you want.
CNCROi.com offers our customers endless flexibility, even on low volume production runs – this firefighting plaque for instance was a one-off that was produced and shipped right to the customer’s door.
Whether you want one custom firefighting plaque or hundreds, all the same with different names or different designs all together, CNCROi.com can produce them for you and ship right to your door.
The process of laser engraving, unlike any other machine process in the shop, involves never touching the source material, as such, there is no need to hold it down during production.
Solid surface can be made into a plaque in several different ways, here’s an example of what’s possible.
Laser engraving is a relatively fast process in that everything is done in one shot, the laser engraving doesn’t require additional process to complete this plaque other than sanding and finishing.
The engraving process does produce fire, the irony of using fire to produce a firefighting plaque isn’t beyond me, but like nuclear power, there is both a good and a bad use of any given technology – CNCROi.com uses our powers of creation for the good.
After the laser engraving process is complete, you can see the smoke and resin that settled all over the surface of the custom Acadia firefighting plaque.
When it comes to metal, CNCROi.com can make just about anything you can imagine.
Before sanding this firefighting plaque, I needed to cut it down to size, it’s roughly 11″ square.
After cutting the plaque square, you can see my laser engraved lines in the picture above for reference, it’s time to throw it on the sanding station and start sanding!
It’s quite a transformation, sanding lightens the entire surface and cleans it off all the smoke that settled on the surfaced of the firefighting plaque.
After cleaning-up the saw dust that settled on the plaque after sanding the firefighting plaque.
The finished plaque is now ready to ship to the customer, any size, shape, material or design, contact CNCROi.com to have your very own custom plaque made!