I feel I should start off by admitting that I know very little about lasers(pretty much next to nothing to be truthful), I am a 52 year old machinist of 32 years and I am bored with my life and wanna try something new. I watched this guy's youtube video :
and decided "wow, this looks pretty kickass, I wanna try this" and so here I am..(GOD HELP US ALL)........
I have no doubts about the mechanical end of things as far as building the structural parts and I'm halfway sure that I can wire everything but I fall very short where it comes to picking out a laser tube, power supply and chiller. I am very hopeful that someone hanging around here might be kind enough to help me out by checking out this link to the one I was considering and inform me as to weather or not this is a wise choice. https://bescutter.com/collections/la...stem-260w-300w
My guess is that the relplies that I may get from this are going to be something along the lines of "wow that is a lot of power for a machine that size" or "you dumbass,,,,,That will never work" . I am prepared to be told anything here so don't hold back if this is a stupid idea, I will appreciate being told so.
This project is just a "toy" for me, I not looking to profit from this or anything along those lines. I really just want to do something more exciting with my life than sitting around riding some barstool or something~~~~~
Thanks for taking the time to read my post. If you have something to say, good , bad or indifferent,,,,,,,,, I would appreciate some input.
You never know what conceptions people have about CO2 laser cutters Some believe they cut metal, which they do not. Some believe they replace woodworking tools like band saws, which they do not.
Defining what you want to do with the machine helps define the size and power.
Just like a cnc router it is possible to build one from scratch, depending on how available tubes are in your country.
Thankyou for the reply sir. I have dabbled in a bit of cnc programming and have my own cam system which I have used at my job numerous times and have grown quite fond of drawing stuff up and with that comes the delima,,,,,,,,,,, what can I do with this????? I would like to be able to cut these designs in plywood and acrylic as well as engraving in these materials. Dont really want to limit myself to anything I don't have too because of power and that is why I was willing to spend this much on a tube. I realise I am not going to cut metal although It would not hurt my feelings if I were able to cut through some thinner shimstock. it would be nice to be able to cut through gasket material as well. I am going about this project as somewhat of an experiment and the way I look at it is this,,,,,,, there will be a bunch of things I can and cant do with it and whatever comes of it is what comes. I'm not going to have some ridiculously high expectations and in this I won't be let down........... My first thoughts are if I can cut a certain thickness material with one size tube then I should be able to cut something thicker with a bigger tube and if this is incorrect then I suppose it is a good thing that I came here and asked.........
I appreciate your input very much.........
Could you help me pick a laser tube please?
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