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Demystify cheap EBAY laser cutters?

Former Member

I'd really like to make the leap into playing with a laser cutter - and there are a million (ok, maybe not a MILLION) of them on EBAY in the 500-600 range. But reading reviews, doing a bit of light research, watching some youtube videos, there's not a lot of info about how to really get started with these things if you're brandy-new to laser cutting.  Ben's done a couple videos that involve laser cutting, and is constantly using it in his projects, but what I'd REALLY like is a sort of "getting started with a cheap EBAY laser cutter" video, or even a whole series. Maybe something where Ben buys one of those super-common 500-600 range laser cutters, gets it up and running, explains how the software for them works (because they all seem to want to use Corel Draw from what I've read, but using something like Inkscape would probably be a lot more flexible), and how to get the "most" out of them, given their limitations.

 

Other things that would be really interesting:

1. What other kinds of software can be used with these el-cheapo laser cutters? See aforementioned Inkscape (or Illustrator?)

2. What simple upgrades/improvements should be made to them to keep them running reliably or improve their performance

3. How "hackable" are they? I.e., after buying one could it be torn apart and the build size increased?

 

Thanks for a great show! Watch it every week!

Parents

  • I've used my fair share of nice name brand lasers as well as cheap so-Chinese-they-don't-have-a-name-brand lasers. They're all a little different. The Chinese ones usually come with their own crappy software and there usually isn't an alternative other than possibly using Corel Draw. Usually what you have to do is design in different software and figure out what format is ideal(usually .dxf) to save as and import your design file into the crappy software to send it to the laser. [This can be a serious pain as different design elements can export and import differently. Our laser uses .dxf or Illustrator 8 files, but still inconsistently.]

     

    No matter what they tell you, all lasers needs some sort of ventilation. So assume you'll need to set up a fan and duct system and cut a whole in an exterior wall. I've never tested it, but it might be possible to use a very fine filter to avoid exhausting outside, though I've never seen this done successfully.

     

    The cheap lasers will have an advertised wattage, but sometimes they don't actually operate at that power. Our hackerspace 50w laser only operates at 32w with a new tube. The power level of the tube determines how thick of material you will be able to cut through.

     

    To help your laser last longer,

    • Carefully clean the mirrors and lenses regularly.
    • Don't run your laser at full power. Keep it to 80-90% as it should lengthen the life of your laser tube.
    • To extend the life of your servo motors, mind your speed when etching. The laser head travels back and forth quickly having to ramp up and slow down at either end. If you're etching a small area, you may want to decrease your speed so that the rapid start and stop motion of the servos doesn't wear on them as much.

    Lasers are hackable, or you can buy a kit and build one from scratch. I just visited Dallas Makerspace and they have a laser with a decent sized bed that was built from scratch.

    Something to consider, the focus range of a laser is quite small so the axis need to be very level and very square. If they are not, you will get uneven cuts or areas that will simply not cut through. The focus area of a weak(<60w) laser can be less than 1/4". When building a DIY unit, it is very easy to have the height difference of your axis be off that small amount.

     

    Laser cheat: If you have a weaker laser and want to cut through material thicker than what your laser can handle, sometimes you can refocus the z-axis so that it is not focused to the top of your material as you would normally focus, but raise the z-axis so that the laser is focused on the center of the material. You'd have to eyeball this typically, but I've had it work often for me. This is typically done on a second pass. This technique may yield a larger kerf.

     

    Note: If a laser says it can cut through 1/4" material, that doesn't always mean ANY 1/4" material. Solid lumber is easier to cut through than plywood because plywood contains glue, which is harder to cut through. Likewise, MDF or hardboard can be harder to cut through because it also contains glue. So if you can cut through 1/4" bass wood, you may not be able to cut through 1/4" MDF.

     

    If you have other laser questions, I'd be happy to help!

  • in reply to makerkaren

    Thanks for the response! Something I'm really curious if you know how these lasers are "driven". I know that, for example, my 3D printer uses GCODE that's sent serially (ok, USB but acting as a serial connection), but I'm curious if there's any info out there about how these lasers are typically driven. My suspicion is that they're driven like a printer - so something like a printer driver is actually handling the communication. So it'd be proprietary, and short of decompiling the driver or otherwise reverse engineering the protocol, there probably isn't much out there.

     

    Anyway, thanks again for the response!

     

    Oh, and just because I'm dying of curiosity, is this THE Karen from TBHS? Cause if so, that's AWESOME.

  • in reply to Former Member

    The likes of the Spirit GE uses a printer driver. It's actually more like a pen plotter driver as it uses the different 'pens' to do different types of cut allowing you to set different speed and power for cutting versus engraving operations. If you draw the design in Corel Draw then you use different line colours to denote the different types of cut you want which are then defined in the printer driver.

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