Hi,
I'm Building an OX CNC from openbuilds, when I finish to build i want extend this with a laser, I work with acrylic and wood material, like plywood or alder, 5-10mm of thickness I have researched a lot on the web and on forums, and I have understood that If i want cut these material with laser, I need a CO2 laser of more than 40W, and I see that this type of laser needs air filtering that at the moment I'm not going to add, so I moved only on the engraving part and not cutting part, my goal is to engrave something like this:
or this:
so I need something that can engrave with very precision, and with 1 mm or 2mm depth of engraving, what laser do you think i can buy?
I do not want to spend a lot of money, but don't want waste money in something that couldn't fit in what i need, so, can you recommend something?
I have looked at the 2W 445nm laser but I don't know if with that laser I achieve something similar, my goal is the dinosaur image
I am in the same boat with you in terms of engraving needs.
For me the decision was easy as I have some knowledge, so I got a chinese K40 clone and replaced the crappy origianl controller right away with an Arduino Mega and run a modfied Marlin version on it.
Having said that you really need to realise that there is little difference between cutting and engraving 2.5D in terms of fumes and smoke produced!
So without a proper enclosure and exhaust system will will need to operate outside.
The Ox build as far as I know it should allow you replace the engraving head with a laser head, maybe with a suitable quick fitting...
But for a CO2 system it means you need add a mirror on the moving X-axis, this needs to be considered for the design to prevent anything obstructing the path for the laser beam.
If you really need to cut wood as thick as 10mm you should consider doing the cutting to size manually as even a 40W laser will struggle here, not to mention the problem of providing optics for a suitable beam patter to cut that deep.
Laser diodes have come a long way and especially in the lower blue spectrum the power input to desturction level is really good.
Normal photo engraving can be done with just 2W here and also with a much higher resolution due to the wavelength of the light.
In the 5W range cutting 3mm wood at low speeds is no problem, although often mulitple passes are required.
A downside with diode lasers can be the focal length.
On your OX you can really position the laser high above the work area, so a short focal length is required, which again makes cutting complicated but engravings look great.
In terms of controlling all this your options right now are a bit limited.
GRBL offers laser support if you stick strictly to the guidelines and more and more programs come up allowing you to use GRBL even for photo engraving - which is the base for 2.5D engravings.
Image2Gcode and Laserwb are just two examples here.
I use a modified version of MarlinKimbra for my laser and if you need I can provide a link to my Github for the firmware.
As said you main concern should be on deciding if you can do with a diode or if you need a CO2 system, in any case you will need an enclosure and proper exhaust system!
To keep it simple a box with a clear window that you can place over the machine will do - make the air inlet in the front and get the smoke out in the back.
For 2.5D engravings you will need air assist as well!
Meaning you need either a nozzle over your laser lens or a seperate nozzle to blow air directly into the laser spot.
If you only want to engrave and very high speeds are not a reuirement than a diode laserin the 3W region would be sufficient.
But if you plan on doing bigger engravings like 20x20cm in photo quality it will take a lot of time.
CO2 laser offer higher speeds here but it not always easy to get the shading of engravings right to the nature of the wavelength.
So that basically leaves you with diode lasers here.
There are quite a few youtube videos showing diode lasers engraving, from cheap system to really good ones.
Would give you an idea what to expect in terms of speed and quality...
J-cut is the worst kind of machine supplier. Recently got machine with horrible packing. The machine broke the bottom of the bare minimum supports a the legs of the machine was hanging out when it arrived at our port. What is worse, no grease on linear guides and ballscrews, which lead to very bad rusting. The paint job was very amateurish. Whats more, J-cut refuses to send the parts and demands payment for the broken and rusted parts.
Guys, please be extra careful, seems to me that it is a scam company.
The laser engraver of China Perfect Laser is of high quality and is easy to use. After expanding the size of our company we decided to order a few more. The machine is consistent with the description, the quality is good, and the logistics service is also good.There was a time when there was a glitch in it so I called them and they immediately told me where was the problem. The after-sales service is also good,maybe you could consider about the China Perfect Laser,the website https://www.perfectlaser.net/
Advice on laser engraver to buy
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