Today we were approached by someone local selling a laser cutter which we would consider if there is enough interest in members for us to have an additional (larger) cutter within the space
There are still some factors outstanding that might prevent this being an option (eg how long we have to move it and the life of the laser tube) however basic stats are
Control system:DSP
Working size: 20"x28"(500mm x 700mm) with double side open door
Up and down work plate: 7.8" (200mm)
Laser tube type: CO2 Glass sealed laser tube
Laser power: 60W
Driver type: Micro Stepping Motor
Max speed: 1000mm/s
Resolution: 1000 DPI Location precision: 0.01mm
PC Interface: USB2.0 and USB Disk
Software: AutoLaser
Image form: HPGL, BMP, GIF, JPG, JPEG, DXF, DST, AI
Machine Dimension(L/W/H): 1150860970(mm)
We would need to refit it to work with VisiCut / LAOS board but it would provide us with an additional laser cutter with a larger bed, the upside being that 2 lasers means more productivity
Please comment if you are interested in pledging towards this (and how much) we would need to raise approx £950 to cover the cost of the laser cutter (£800 and £150 towards a LAOS board and components) At the moment there is no obligation on pledges etc as we want to gauge interest before committing to buying it or not.
As with the previous laser cutter pledge those who pledge will be given the amount back in laser time eg if you pledge £20 you will receive £20 worth of laser time.
I personally have rarely seen our laser cutter being used so much that people are waiting to use it but the larger bed size looks nice.
If we are wanting to stick with LAOS, could we look at buying the laser cutter but not the board, assuming they are selling them separately, and retrofit our board into the new cutter which would save £150 and might make it more attainable.
Yeah retrofitting with our existing board is an option just means the laser would be out of commission whilst it happened the other option is using it with the board/software that comes with the laser but apparently that only runs on windows and isn’t the best but again its an option with a longer term project being to move it to a LAOS board…
I’d be tempted to investigate alternatives to Laoslaser since the last updates to it look a bit old and crusty
plus if we get something that does gcode as well as visicut it opens the door to other softwares
Other options for controlling it are always a possibility if someone is willing to put the work in to do it. this post is more to gauge interest in getting the bigger laser rather than the finer points of control board and such it just includes the LAOS board part because we have someone willing to do the electronics for that but for now the main part is the actual interest in the bigger laser at £800.
Some more info on it. Suspect given the timescales this won’t be doable
Looking to move it as soon as possible really as the studio need to moving, the latest probably being in 2 weeks time. It is slightly limited availability as we could only arrange collection on a Thursday evening 5-8pm, or any time Friday daytime.
The machine was bought in 2016 and parts haven’t been replaced since as it hasn’t had a huge amount of usage and hasn’t needed them changing. I used it to engrave my work that I sold and displayed in shows however had to leave the studio a year and a half ago so hasn’t been used since.
Due to the price as it was only £1800 brand new, I’m sure you can appreciate that it is very much a manual machine, with out all the flashy presets that a lot of expensive machines have. So it would really need to go to a home where someone’s willing to spend time with it calibrating the setting etc for how you want to use it. I only ever needed to use it for engraving and it was perfect, however I haven’t explored the settings for cutting as I never needed to.
I have the original manuals, software on disc and all extra accessories that came with it. Let me know if you need to know anything else.
