First, an apology: my attempts at close quarters photography are a bit poor tonight, for this I am sorry. I blame the earthquakes.
Last Sunday I took the opportunity to experiment with my friends laser cutter. My experiment was aimed at producing relief detail in styrene, i.e raised details. This was my first time dealing with laser cut styrene and also my friends first dealings with it. Oh dear. I understand now why people may have mixed results with laser cut styrene models. It is a sod to work with on the laser. The main issue seems to be the amount of heat it retains and the time it retains that heat for. While "rastering" (engraving) the details in works reasonably well, if the vector cut (the actual cutting out of the component) is done immediately afterwards, the item is guaranteed to warp like drying timber. There are ways to mitigate this, multiple passes at low power, leaving the item to cool before cutting, use thinner material.
