The good news:
I have gotten some pens from JDS that laser very well. For example the pen starts blue and after engraving shows gold underneath.
The problem:
As most pens are want to do the bottom half has a wee bit of a taper. When I engrave, I must prop the tip up so that the engraving surface is perfectly straight. If I leave even a wee bit of a slant than no matter how much power I through at the pen, up to the max on my 45 watt laser, or how slow I engrave, down to 5 speed, the fool thing will not engrave correctly.
The engraver just peels off a small bit of the top layer leaving a greenish hue to the text. This remains true even if I do multiple passes. I have tried setting the focal point a wee bit close to the pen to compensate for the taper and it still does not work.
If I prop up the end then I can engrave at 30 speed/70 power (This is on an Epilog 24 EX 45 Watt laser) and all is well.
The Question: is this just ‘business as usual’ for a laser engraver? The slant just does not seem great enough to cause this much grief. Then again it only took me 5 pens to figure the darn thing out.
I use SILLY PUTTY as a jig it works great — I bought it at Toys are US.
The problem with silly putty is that it is constantly “melting”. Use regular children’s Play-do modeling clay. I put a piece of thin plastic food wrap over the clay, (keeps the pens clean), press, check for level, then laser. If you always do the same type of pens, use a clay that hardens. I love jigs and templates!