Need help connecting a TTL/PWM laser to my chinese 6040 cnc

[chris190]

Hi everyone,

I got me one of those ebay lasers (15w) and I’m trying to adapt it to my chinese 6040 machine... So I cut an aluminum 1/8” plate and drilled it to fit it on the spindle as you see in the pictures ... pulled the wires through etc..my issue now that i'm trying to understand is how do you wire the TTL/PWM wire(s) correctly.

The laser is 15w with 8W average and it says it has TTL and PWM control. The laser board which is small has 4 control input pins as seen in the laser pic I took of ebay...one pin looks like it says TTL next to it ... 2 of the pins looks like they are for ground connections and the 4 th pin that has a + sign next to it I assume is the PWM input but it’s not labeled as such.. just the +

One questions I have is : Do the wires that connect to the laser’s TTL/PWM come from the DB25 connector or from the actual stepper motors wires? Now I have wires pulled to the db25 but I want to make sure before I try this thing.
Is the TTL/PWM one wire input or are they 2 separate inputs? I was reading that the direction pin goes to TTL and the step pin goes to PWM which makes me think they are 2 separate inputs.

I plan on connecting this laser to the 4 th Axis A which I don’t use yet.
Attached are some pics of my machine and the laser including the little board where the power connects and where are also the 4 input pins.

I will plan to use this with mach3

Any feedback on this would be very helpful

Thanks in advance!

Chris




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[wmgeorge]

I really hate to post this, but first how many amps does that looks like a laptop 12 volt power supply put out? I had a laser diode project that looked just like yours except for the little circuit board.... the diode I had was rated at 5 watts and the power input was limited to either 3 or 4 amps. I wasted a Lot of time and extra money getting it to work. It kind of worked but was very disappointed. It was slow and the dot quality was very poor. Your PWM or TTL signal comes from your controller board as Mach 3 or whatever. PWM for grey scale never happened and but the TTL did work on mine.

There are people using a Arduino board and gerbil like > Grbl - A Quick CNC Wiki I might have some stuff still around I would sell for cheap,

[chris190]

Hi wmgeorge, Thank you for the info....that gerbil software looks interesting ... I have a 2560 mega Kit card that I could use for it but I ready that it has to have the atmega 328 microchip.. I will check on that.
I really have no high hopes for this laser and even less hopes for its psu which you're right it's prolly overrated but I will measure the amps on the actual diode once I turn it on again and see exactly.
What do you mean by the laser being slow? So in my case the PWM/TTL signal would come from my parallel port pins correct? for example whatever pin I assign in Mach3 for axis A direction that's the pin I locate on the DB25 paralel port and connect the wire to the laser input board correct?

Thanks again
Chris

[wmgeorge]

You need to see a "Real" laser engraver in action, slow is relative. If your used to CNC routers or milling machines your diode will feel right at home.
Locate JTech website in Texas he does a lot with diode lasers and has all sorts of info. The other website is Pic laser.
I have a diode control board from the guy in Russia that will do a full 5 watt laser diode. I might even have a preloaded Arduino board new never used but a spare. I finally got tired of messing with the one I had and it was working. Sold everything for $200, nearly $500 invested all in all.

Link > https://jtechphotonics.com/

Link> https://www.picengrave.com/Pic%20Programs.htm

[chris190]

Thanks for the information. The jtechphotonics site has a lot of good info... will research more on this ... I will want to also upgrade my controller too to the Gecko G540 controller too