How I Etched a Mailbox Using a Laser Cutter

I made it at TechShop. (www.techshop.ws )
My husband hated our mailbox, so for father’s day this year, I made my husband a new mailbox using a store bought mailbox and a laser cutter.

Buy a mailbox.

Get a design you want. I used a non-trademarked letter “m” (it stands for mailman, my husband’s a mailman. Yeah, that’s it. )

Lesson 1: Be sure to test your design on scrap first. My image was in a grayscale, I didn’t realize it was so dark on some of the sections. I’m glad I tested first (left) I then refined my image retested and was happy with the results (right). So, on to the mailbox.

Lesson 2: When placing the mailbox image, I made my page dimensions the same as my mailbox so I could place the image where I wanted. HOWEVER, I forgot to change the size on the print  screen.  I was lucky when the laser started cutting it only moved my image over a few inches. So instead of being in the middle it was on the side. OOPS. Well, it still looked good and didn’t etch off of my mailbox.

Lesson 3:  When faced with a mistake, make it look intentional. I put our family name in the empty space and no one will ever know it was a mistake……….well, except you guys. But, you won’t tell right?