Does anyone have experience with CNCShop 130w laser?

[jreynolds5]

I am looking at purchasing a laser engraver/cutter to expand my graphics business and I found this CNCShop 130w laser on Amazon and am wondering if anyone has any experience with this particular machine. Thanks in advance.


https://www.amazon.com/CNCShop-Engra.../dp/B01ESQWB44

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[SPT-Laser]

Hello,

130w laser engraver? What material and the thickness you mainly do?

[jreynolds5]

Nothing as of yet. but I want to have something that in not going to be highly limiting on what I can do or size I can do. I plan on doing wood, aluminum, stainless, plastic, glass....basically anything I can do. We currently do etched glass work via acid etch and would like to go to laser etch....hence the importance of a rotary axis. And at the wok area size...approx 55 x 35 inches....I would be open to engraving and cutting lots of things.

Hello,

130w laser engraver? What material and the thickness you mainly do?

[vizardknight]

This link is a bit old but will post just in case you or others are interested as I have not found very much information out there on the CNCShop machines.
I just picked up one of these machines used, only 6 months old and was only used a handful of times. This machine is in my opinion the best bang for the buck, especially when it come to larger format engraving and cutting.
I have experience with setting up and running two other laser machines (Full Spectrum Laser 90 Watt 24x36" $10k machine & Epilog 100Watt, 18?x30ish" $50k machine), both of which are way more expensive but do basically the same thing.

I'm sure you have read up on materials and what you can and can't run in the machine and that CO2 laser machines do not cut metals with this setup.

I am just starting to get up and running on this machine (CNCShop 130 Watt, 57"x39", $5K machine). I looked into building my own machine but even at $5K you couldn't even come close to building one of these in any reasonable amount of time. I was getting caught up in trying to decide which linear rail systems would provide 1000mm/sec X axis times and the whole thought of welding up one of these cabinets and making all the sheet metal doors (over 10 doors with locks!).

Upgrades this machine needs right out of the box are:
1) Get rid of the crappy little red dot laser pointer attached to the laser head and install a beam combiner to get the red laser mixed into the path of the CO2 beam. This is invaluable as it provides a LOT of information besides exact position of the CO2 beam for setting up projects. It also provides instant feedback when setting up a project as to the health of all the mirrors (if red dot is skewed or attenuated you need to STOP and clean or replace some of the optics.). Smoke should never be allowed OVER the X carriage beam, else you will be attenuating the CO2 beam and not getting reliable results in cut/engraving. Smoke and vaporized particulate matter can accumulate on the optic mirrors. The CO2 beam is invisible bUT the red dot laser is very visible when shot thru smoke. So, the red laser beam will appear visible when smoke goes over the X carriage indicating you need more ventilation or change your parameters for a particular job.

2) I'm not convinced as of yet whether or not one vent is enough to pull smoke from this huge cutting bed. I'm looking into making a second port hole to hook up a second ventilation blower on the other side of the machine. This machine just evacuates the entire lower cabinet. The more expensive machines have a much smaller specific welded box to perform fume/dust extraction, which is way more efficient at extraction. The blower that came with my machine is a little smaller than the standard ones you see for laser machines. Not sure if this was provided by CNCShop or if the person I got the machine from purchased it separately (I would guess the latter).

3) You really have to have an AMP meter to watch that you don't overdrive the laser tube. All laser tubes have recommendations from the MFG to get the full 2,000 hours operation (cheap laser tube), usually around 20mA maximum. Installing an amp meter is super simple and only requires cutting one wire and running two wires to the amp meter.

4) The USB connection on the side of the machine connect to a computer uses a gender of USB cable I didn't have laying around. It uses a USB male to USB male. This is probably just a nit pick.

Things that I was worried about but turned out good or even great:
1) The Z table operation and jog pushbuttons on the side of the machine are awesome and works perfectly, not too fast and not too slow. This works better than ANY machine I have run yet.
2) The speed of the X carriage for raster engraving is right on par with all the other machines I used.
3) Using the RDWorks 8.0 to drive this machine is awesome. Works very well and there are a heap of youtube videos for instruction on how to use.
4) The controller on the machine works very well for running projects and I like how each project gets stored so you could go back and run a previous project with a few button clicks, even without a computer attached.

This machine weighs in at 606lbs! I have to remove the entire sliding glass door jam framing and all to get this monster into my basement!
I used two plywood sheets ripped lengthwise to make flat rolling surface to roll this beast thru the yard to the back of my house.

Post any questions and I'll be happy to comment.

Nothing as of yet. but I want to have something that in not going to be highly limiting on what I can do or size I can do. I plan on doing wood, aluminum, stainless, plastic, glass....basically anything I can do. We currently do etched glass work via acid etch and would like to go to laser etch....hence the importance of a rotary axis. And at the wok area size...approx 55 x 35 inches....I would be open to engraving and cutting lots of things.

[gweikelaser]

Dear Jreynolds5.

how about our machine http://www.wklaser.com/index.php?m=c...145&l=2&id=286

it can work on metal and nonmetal ,here is the video

I am looking at purchasing a laser engraver/cutter to expand my graphics business and I found this CNCShop 130w laser on Amazon and am wondering if anyone has any experience with this particular machine. Thanks in advance.


https://www.amazon.com/CNCShop-Engra.../dp/B01ESQWB44

[jreynolds5]

I have actually changed my interest and focus to the smaller cheaper 60w models forund on ebay and amazon. Since my main interest is engraving with some possible cutting of acryilic and maybe leather the cheaper 60w should serve the purpose. I am hoping to buy by the end of the year.