Painted Melamine

[GMTH]

Hey everyone!

Here's the question for this discussion: out of those of you who have painted the edges of your laser cut melamine (before removing the mask), did you do this as an aesthetic choice or a functional one? We are planning to paint our melamine, but more to seal it from changes in humidity to prevent any warping in the structure of the printer as the seasons change than to make it pretty. Any thoughts on this?

Cheers!
Charlie

[Mac The Knife]

Humidity was my main purpose for doing so.

[GMTH]

Alright, excellent. Does painting the parts mess with the way the fit together?

[Jimustanguitar]

I painted mine for looks.

It does effect the fit slightly. What happens is that the paint also coats the edge of the masking paper, and when you take the paper off it leaves a slightly raised corner. Scraping the edges with an old credit card or plastic scraper after removing the paper would do the trick and solve that problem though.

[GMTH]

Great, what about parts like the belt clamps? i can picture the paint filling the relief on the business end of the things and compromising their function. I'm about to send the whole batch of parts down to the spray room to get primed and painted, should I leave the clamps out?