Tim Wehr shows laser art at Farmers Market

Visitors to Washington?s Farmers Market on Thursday were treated to quite a sight. Former Washington resident Tim Wehr had on display his crafts of a most unusual nature. Wehr was selling wooden items that were engraved with a laser. Not only that, but the laser used to make the engravings is on a machine Wehr built himself.

Wehr?s brother, Tom Wehr of Washington, told Tim about the lively Farmers Market in town. Wehr set up two tables at the market. One was dedicated to placards with funny or heartwarming sayings on them. Wehr finds the sayings on the Internet and wherever else he can. He even saw a T-shirt at the market with a phrase he liked, so he wrote it down in his notebook, perhaps to use on future placards.

?Sometimes, people come up and tell me, ?Oh man, I?ve got a good one for you,?? he said.

The other table was dedicated to showing off personalized artwork, such as wedding albums that bore the name of the couple engraved on the cover.

?These are super popular for weddings,? said Wehr. ?What about a new birth? You can do a book with birth information on the cover and pictures inside.?

Wehr has wooden blocks into which he cuts letters, and then strings the blocks together so they can be hung from a high place. Wehr?s laser can work with glass, too. Wehr displayed glass candle holders with names written on them that were made with the laser. He said the laser can engrave on nearly any material with the exception of metal, which requires a laser all its own. Wehr said the laser can cut designs into denim jeans. The only thing he has to do is reduce the power of the laser. If he went from engraving on wood to engraving on denim without changing any of the laser?s settings, it would burn a hole in the jeans.

Wehr lives in Coralville and has done laser work as a hobby for the past three years. He met other people throughout the world who shared his interests in lasers. A group of them felt they could build their own laser cutter. Wehr has worked with computers in some capacity for 37 years, and he jumped at the challenge.

A core team of 10 people, including Wehr, did the design work for a new laser-cutting machine. After they agreed on a design, Wehr built the machine, which he did just two months ago. Wehr and his friends do not plan to sell their device. In fact, Wehr said they have published the instructions for making it on the Internet.

?It?s all open source,? said Wehr. ?Anyone who wants to build it can download the plans.?

Wehr said he opens a design program to make the image he wants to appear on the placard, album cover or candle holder. Then he tells the computer how much speed and power to apply to each part of the image, which affects how deeply the laser cuts. The program relays that information to a control box on the laser. Wehr just has to push a button and the laser goes to work carving his masterpiece.

The laser cuts into the wood just as a modern printer puts ink on a page. It runs horizontally over the top part of the image, making cuts into the wood where necessary. Then the laser moves down slightly and makes another run across the image. This process is repeated until all the cuts have been made.