The rotary tool is a special attachment for the laser cutter that allows it to engrave on cylindrical objects such as tubes, water bottles and some glassware.

IMPORTANT!!- Before plugging in or removing the Rotary Tool, make sure that the Laser Cutter is powered down. If it's on, the motherboard will fry!

Hardware Setup

Removing the honeycomb grated plate. The grated plate is best removed from above by flipping the rulers up and pulling the plate up. Set on a table.
Open the door on the front of the Epilog machine.
Remove the crumb tray. The crumb tray is removed by opening the front panel of the cutter, flipping the two tabs on the tray up and pulling it out. Set on a table.

Epilog front door opened with crumb tray coming out

Take the rotary tool out of the tech cabinet and check it out to the customer. Plug the tool in as shown below. Again, make SURE that the laser cutter itself is switched OFF before plugging in or unplugging the tool.

Rotary tool plugged into the epilog The plug for the rotary tool

Once the rotary tool has been plugged in, turn the laser cutter.
Set your object onto the rubber wheels, adjusting as needed to accommodate your object's height. There is a small knob on the right hand side of the rotary tool that can adjust the tool's elevation, which is useful for engraving on sloped surfaces.

Rotary tool with the height adjusted to higher to the right

Focus the laser just as you would for a standard job. Use the triangular tool to measure the proper distance from the top-facing part of the object's surface.

A hydroflask placed on the rotary tool in the epilog.

Software Setup

Open Engravelab.
When creating a plate size for a rotary tool object, the entire surface area of the object must be accounted for. Because it's resting horizontally, the objects height will be listed as the width in Engravelab.

The height dimension you feed into Engravelab will be taken from the object's circumference (calculated as diameter times pi).

This hydroflask above is 9 inches tall and has a diameter of 2.75 (and therefore a circumference of 8.64). The height of my plate will be 8.64 and the width will be 9.

Engravelab screen with plate sized for a hydroflask

It can be difficult to wrap your head around how this plate is a representation of the object you have in the laser cutter, but be assured, where you place images on your plate will make a big difference on what you produce.

Imagine that the plate wraps around the object like a sheet of plastic, and that it starts at whatever point on the object is currently facing up.

Engravelab screen with a hydroflask image in it to show the correct sized plate

Looking at the image above we can get a better sense of where an image might go depending on where we place it. An image placed along the very top border of the plate will start engraving right away, whereas something in the center of the plate will likely end up on the backside of the object.

**Troubleshoot**
	Before you start a job on the round object, you should always test the placement of the engraving. Wrap the object in paper and running the job at a very low (10-20) power setting to see exactly where and engraving will end up. If all looks well, place your object back in the desired position once you've taken the paper off!

Engrave an Image

Find an image online that will be engraved.
Set it up in Engravelab to cut wherever you'd like on your material.
Grab a cardboard roll from the scrap bin.
Set it on the rotary tool.
Put in your engrave print settings and engrave.

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