Is the laser cutter really for cutting 1/2" plywood?

[Ryan Mcdermott]

I see people doing this once in a while.  My instinct is "hey, that's really not what that tool is for, and it's probably also really hard on the tool."

Am I right about this?  In the classes, I tell people that they *can* cut half inch plywood with the laser, but that that's a really poor use of the tool, since that has always been my understanding.

Is this not right?

[Ryan Mcdermott]

This was prompted by somebody wanted to get help cutting 1/2" plywood.  They had been in earlier (on Monday) to do a similar job, which they got help with.

a 1hr long job at 100% power.  It was 5 passes at 2mm/s and 100% power.

Also this didn't get logged :(

(I told this person that we should just score the wood with the laser to get a good layout, and he's going to cut it out on the bandsaw.  Although since it's just a straight up square, maybe using the table saw would be better?)

[Chad Stearns]

Whenever I give a tour, I show off the 1" (or was it 3/4"?) wood I cut once. I always say 'I did this once and havent been able to do it since then'. David Farmer recently tried to cut similarly thick particle board, it was not a success. I really like to cut 3/8" plywood, but I have found that its far more difficult to cut than 1/4"; so I doubt 1/2" could be reliably cut.

-ChadTech

[Jacob Rosenthal]

5 passes is the tell.

If you cant do it in 1, with a possible 2nd to clean something up, you're using the wrong tool.

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "HeatSync Labs" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to heatsynclabs...@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

[Will Bradley]

Or even using a tool at 100% of its capacity.

[Corey Renner]

If it were me, I'd stop showing that 1" thick cut piece.  What does it demonstrate other than the fact that the laser can be abused?  Nate used to do something similar that left me scratching my head.  He would tell people that it was bad to crash the laser head into things, then he would crash the laser head into something to show what he meant.  He probably crashed it intentionally during training more times than it ever would have been crashed accidentally.  I never understood why he felt that an intentional crash would be less harmful than an inadvertent one.

cheers,

c

Blog:

http://coreyrenner.tumblr.com/

 

YouTube Channel:

http://www.youtube.com/user/vandal968

--

[Larry Campbell]

I fully agree, the laser should not have to be run at 100% nor should it EVER take a third pass... that is indeed brutally abusive to the tool and certainly does not make a nice cut.... anyone needing to cut something half inch thick should be using a bandsaw or a scroll saw...They are being lazy, wanting the laser to do the work for them.

we should determine what the thickest wood and the thickest acrylic the laser will cut at 90% in two passes and say that is the absolute max...period... Im not even fond of the idea of two passes at 90% Jacob saying a second pass should be a cleanup pass is very sensible.

[Larry Campbell]

I would say that if someone needed to cut a detailed pattern onto something thick, maybe a 20% pass to do the outline for cutting with a bandsaw/sabresaw/scrollsaw

[Chad Stearns]

Thats a pretty fair point. Ill think twice about that next time Im showing off the laser.

-ChadTech

On Saturday, March 8, 2014 6:03:24 PM UTC-7, Corey Renner wrote:

[JR]

Many valid points about the abuse running the laser at 100% does on the tube.

I can see doing ~3 passes if you were running at a lower power and lowered the Z axis each time so that the laser was properly focused.  That's certainly better than running at 100% power and cutting well beyond the focal length.

Another thing to remember is that thicker piece was probably cut with the original 100W tube.  The current tube is only 80W, so while the laser may have cut it with the old tube, it probably can't now.

[Will Bradley]

Also, at a certain point the wood/glue has carbonized into a thick char that the laser won't get through anymore. If the laser doesn't blast material through with ease, it's just burning/melting which usually isn't desirable.

[Philip Haasnoot]

Does the Laser cutter at HSL have an attached water chiller? I never run my machine more than 2 passes (mine has a 40W tube), and you need to be mindful of the water temperature to protect the laser tube so lengthy runs at max power are really hard on the machine. My personal belief is that anything thicker than 3/8" should be cut on something else, like a CNC router. 

In my mind, if you ever say "I got the machine to do this once, and was never able to again" that action was detrimental to the tool. Are the mirrors and lenses in good shape? I recently had to replace my 2" focal lens as it was deteriorating, if the HSL machine is being used for such duration's and powers you might want to check the lenses and mirrors for damage.  

Just my 2 cents.