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Laser Applications

Laser Cutting & Engraving Wood

Laser cutters for mdf, plywood, alder, cherry, and other wood types!

Laser Engrave and Cut Wood with Precision and Speed

Create stunning wood products, personalized gifts, prototypes, signage, cabinetry components, and more with an Epilog Laser system.

From hardwoods and plywood to MDF, veneers, walnut, alder, cherry, and maple, Epilog lasers deliver crisp engraving, clean cuts, and the flexibility to take on virtually any woodworking project

Professional Wood Engraving Results Across Every Application

Epilog Laser systems work well with nearly all types wood. See for yourself by taking a look at some common examples:

  • maple laser engraved map of golden, colorado Engraved
    maple laser cut map of golden, colorado Cut
  • birch ply laser engraved map of golden, colorado Engraved
    birch ply laser cut map of golden, colorado Cut
  • alder laser engraved map of golden, colorado Engraved
    alder laser cut map of golden, colorado Cut
  • bamboo laser engraved map of golden, colorado Engraved
    bamboo laser cut map of golden, colorado Cut
  • mdf laser engraved map of golden, colorado Engraved
    mdf laser cut map of golden, colorado Cut
  • walnut laser engraved map of golden, colorado Engraved
    walnut laser cut map of golden, colorado Cut

Why Woodworkers
Choose Epilog

Whether you’re producing custom products, building prototypes, personalizing customer orders, or adding decorative details to high-end woodworking projects, an Epilog Laser helps you do more with a single machine. From photo engravings and inlays to cutting parts and adding personalized designs, the possibilities are nearly endless.

Benefits:

  • Engrave intricate designs and detailed graphics
  • Cut wood components with precision
  • Personalize products on demand
  • Create prototypes faster
  • Produce unique, high-value custom products

Faster Production. Better Results.

Designed for Professional Woodworking

Epilog laser systems are built to help businesses increase efficiency without sacrificing quality.

  • Precision That Stands Out

    Produce detailed engravings, sharp lettering, and intricate artwork that would be difficult or time-consuming with traditional methods. Epilog lasers are known for creating highly detailed engravings across a wide variety of wood species

  • Speed Up Your Workflow

    Go from design to finished product quickly. Laser processing dramatically reduces production time for prototypes, custom orders, and repeat jobs.

  • Make Use of More Materials

    Work with hardwoods, MDF, plywood, veneers, scraps, and specialty woods. The flexibility of laser processing allows you to maximize material use and reduce waste.

  • Scale as You Grow

    Available in multiple work area sizes and wattages—including high-powered systems up to 200 watts—Epilog lasers can support everything from one-off custom projects to high-volume production environments.

2OOW Laser for Thick Cutting & Increased Production

For businesses that need to produce large quantities, the increased power will help meet production demands.
200w for faster engraving and thick wood cutting

Trusted by Businesses Around the World

Your Epilog Laser Journey

Purchasing a laser machine for your existing business or to start a business is an important investment. Epilog tries to make this journey as informative as possible.

Step 1:

Browse our Laser Machines

If you’re looking for an entry-level, mid-level, or high-production laser, Epilog has you covered.

Step 3:

Create with Confidence

Once your laser is set up, you’ll be producing high-quality work, taking on more projects, and growing your business with ease.

    Top 10 FAQs for Wood Laser Engraving & Cutting

    1. What is the best type of laser for engraving and cutting wood?
    For professional and high-quality wood engraving, an Epilog CO2 laser is the undisputed industry standard. While cheap diode lasers can mark wood, their spot size is larger and their cutting power is severely limited. An Epilog CO2 laser operates at a wavelength that organic materials like wood to vaporize in a flash, resulting in deep, dark, and exceptionally crisp engravings. Epilog Laser’s CO2 systems feature high-quality metal/ceramic laser tubes that produce a spot size as small as .004” (the size of a grain of salt), delivering unmatched detail that diode or glass-tube lasers simply cannot replicate.
    2. How thick of wood can a laser cutter handle?
    The maximum cutting thickness depends entirely on the wattage of the laser tube and the quality of the beam. A standard 40W system is excellent for engraving and cutting thin veneers and 1/8″ to 1/4″ hardwoodand plywoods. However, for serious woodworking operations looking to laser slice through 1/2″ to 1” hardwoods or thicker materials efficiently, higher wattages are required. Epilog’s Fusion Pro laser machines scale up to 200 watts, providing the industrial powerhouse capabilities needed for thick, single-pass cuts without excessive charring.
    3. Which types of wood are best for laser engraving?
    Alder, cherry, and maple are widely considered the best woods for laser engraving. These fine-grain, low-resin woods provide a smooth, consistent surface that allows the laser beam to penetrate uniformly, resulting in sharp, dark, and highly defined engravings. High-resin woods like pine, cedar, and spruce tend to burn inconsistently and produce excessive smoke. Epilog systems are highly adaptable, allowing operators to fine-tune speed and power settings in the software to achieve perfect results on any wood species.
    4. How do I prevent scorch marks and charring when laser cutting wood?
    Scorching is caused by excess heat transferring from the laser beam to the surrounding wood. To eliminate this, you need a combination of speed, precise focus, and airflow. Utilizing an Air Assist system—which directs a continuous stream of compressed air at the cutting surface—blows away heat and combustible gases before they can stain the wood. Combined with the high-speed servo motors on Epilog’s Fusion Pro and Fusion Ascent machines, the laser moves fast enough to vaporize the wood without leaving residual burn marks, ensuring clean, professional edges. Finished woods and masking materials can also provide additional barriers to the smoke and debrid settling back into the fibers of wood.
    5. Is a cheap, entry-level laser worth it for a woodworking business?
    For a hobbyist, an entry-level diode might suffice, but for a business, buying cheap often means buying twice. Lower-tier machines suffer from slow processing speeds, frequent breakdowns, and poor customer support, creating a massive bottleneck in production. An Epilog Laser is an investment in an industrial-grade tool. With significantly faster throughput, robust components, and rapid technical support, the ROI on an Epilog system is realized through high-volume production and flawless repeatability.
    6. What size laser bed do I need for woodworking projects?
    The size of your laser bed dictates your production capacity and the scale of your projects. If you are exclusively doing small custom gifts, a smaller format like the Fusion Ascent 24” x 24” is ideal. However, if you are engraving large custom cabinet doors, architectural models, or want to maximize profitability by batch-processing 20 cutting boards at once, a larger work area is essential. Epilog’s Fusion Pro series offers expansive bed sizes and high-wattage options designed specifically for high-throughput, large-scale industrial applications.
    7. How do I perfectly align my design on the wood piece?
    Misalignment results in wasted wood and lost revenue. Modern professional lasers eliminate the guesswork of framing and trial runs. Epilog’s IRIS™ Camera Positioning System features overhead cameras that provide a real-time, high-definition image of the laser bed right on your computer screen. You can literally drag and drop your artwork onto the exact grain pattern or specific area of the wood you want to engrave, ensuring perfect placement every single time.
    8. Can a laser engraver process curved or cylindrical wooden objects?
    Yes, processing items like wooden baseball bats, rolling pins, or pepper mills is incredibly lucrative. To do this, the machine requires a rotary attachment. Instead of the laser moving on the Y-axis, the rotary attachment turns the cylindrical object as the laser fires. Epilog offers highly precise rotary attachments that plug directly into the machine, making it simple to transition from flat panel engraving to cylindrical objects in seconds. As an additional option, Epilog also offers a 4” lenses, which allow for extra clearance and engraving on curved bowl type surfaces as well as items like skateboards.
    9. Do I need an exhaust system to laser engrave wood?
    Absolutely. Vaporizing wood creates smoke, fine particulate dust, and resin fumes. Operating without proper ventilation is dangerous and will quickly ruin the optics of the laser machine. You must either exhaust the fumes outside via a high-capacity fan or use a standalone filtration unit. Epilog systems integrate seamlessly with top-tier extraction units, ensuring your workspace remains clean and the machine’s lenses stay clear for maximum engraving power.
    10. What is the difference between laser engraving, etching, and cutting wood?
    Laser engraving removes material to create a permanent, deep indentation with high contrast. Laser etching is a shallower process that alters the surface color without carving deeply into the wood, allowing for much faster processing times. Laser cutting drives the beam entirely through the material to create custom shapes and clean edges. Epilog’s Software Suite allows you to execute all three processes in a single job—simply color-code your design lines and shapes, and the machine will automatically adjust its speed and power to engrave, etch, and cut seamlessly.

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