Regular readers of this
http://www.ukmonster.co.uk/monster/s...ad.php?t=55168 will know by now that most of my mods fall into the category of "frivolous cosmetic fripperies" and this latest tweak is no exception!
For some time now, one of my Termi stickers has had a bubble behind it, which bugged me a bit, (I know, "first world problems!"), but what can you do? So I went on the Termignoni site to see what decals were available and saw that some of their latest exhausts had laser-etched logos rather than stickers.
A classy look, I thought, then moved on to the stickers. Then a couple of days later, the 12-year-old son of a friend of mine showed me his project for "engineering" (or "metalwork" in the good old days!). One of the things he had to do was to laser-engrave a design to on an object.
I thought back to the Termis and reckoned that, if a state school has an, albeit, basic laser engraver, then there must be firms out there offering a similar service. A quick Google brought up these people a mere 30 minutes from me.
https://www.pmplasertechnology.co.uk/
A very pleasant trip down over Portsdown Hill took me to their works and a meeting with Sean O'Flynn who explained what they could do and what would work on my exhaust.
They can do virtually any design you want. If it's for a global brand, like Termignoni or Ducati, then the various logos are available off-the-shelf. If it's a lesser-known logo, or you want a custom design, then they can create one for you from scratch, although that would obviously take a little longer.
I initially wanted the laser etching, where the surface remains smooth and the laser changes the colour of the metal to whatever the chosen design is. However, Sean felt that the stainless exhaust skin was too thin, (at under 1mm), to take the heat of the etching laser. (Perhaps that's why you only see this etching on the titanium models.)
Instead, he recommended laser engraving, where material is actually removed from the surface and the resulting relief is coloured to bring out the design.
The process was surprisingly quick. The first step is to agree the design. I went for an unfilled outline logo like the Termi titanium above.
The next step is to finalise the position and see whether you are happy with the proposed design. With a sticker that's easy - if you don't like it, just peel it off and put another on. The laser logo is, of course, permanent but there is a way of "printing" the design in a non-permanent way so that you can still make changes if necessary.
What they do is spread some special ink on the workpiece and then pass the laser over the area on a low power setting. This evaporates the ink to reveal the design. It is, effectively, a negative image of the final design.
If you're happy with the test, then the fun starts!
The speed that the laser skips over the object is amazing and quite hypnotic. It first sets out the outline and then starts to remove material from the surface. The process took about 30 minutes for each logo. If you want to see a one minute clip of the laser in action, click on the link at the end of this post (note it's only available until 11 August).