Two effects are discussed. The first involves comparing the breakage of carbon foils (5 mug cm-2) under impact of focused and non-focused beams. Under defocused beam conditions produced by x and y sweeping at frequencies of 1 kHz across the 25 mm2 foil, breakage was reduced by a factor of 5 to 10. Secondly, we discuss the effect of tilting thin foils relative to incoming heavy- ion beams. The final surface interactions change drastically giving rise to changes in the excited heavy ion products. (auth)