Atomstack P7 M40 metal marking

Community Laser Talk
1

Hello,
I am trying to engrave a metal with Atomstack P7 M40 with no success.
Materials to engrave:

  • superfinished aluminum (shiny)
  • natural aluminum (mate)
  • processed aluminium (rough surface with marks)
  • basic metal seet (mate gray color)

I used recommended settings, with absolutely no mark on metal:

  • speed 325 mm/s
  • power 100%
  • interval 0,06 mm

I ran this setting with focus by the provided plastic board (2mm) and also set to 1mm, but in both cases with no success.

Than I also try to set parameters even to 1mm/s, and more passes, but with no result - no markings on surface at all.

I see some people on internet who can engrave on metal sheets fine, with settings mentioned above…
Can you please provide me information what I do wrong?

Attached here file I try to engrave:
znaÄŤenie hlinik AA.lbrn2 (41,0 KB)

2

Metal engraving with a 445 nm diode laser is not really a easy feat.

also, am i wrong to assume you meant 325mm/min but are running mm/sec
This is a order of magnitude faster

Cold you specify the power output of your module?

3

Hello Gil,
thanks for reply.

According to videos like this (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bXLps38citQ) it should be an easy task - meaning settings of speed like 400…

I used correct units in previous post, so speed 325mm/s and later even to 1mm/s.

Atomstack P7 M40 is 40 W power module, within is max laser power 5 - 6W.

4

40W thing is misleading, that’s input power

The 5W optical out is what matters, and at 400mm/min honestly, it won’t work unless you use Cermark or similar
Even 20W will struggle, let alone 5W

Just not the right tool for the job imho

1 Like
5

Speeds in the video are not specified. Watching the video, I seriously doubt it can reach 1500mm/s, so I must resolve that the speeds are in mm/m.

If you’re setup for mm/s and the machine expects mm/m, you’re going to have issues.

Did you follow the Lightburn Grbl setup?

As @gilaraujo advised, you’re likely not going to cut or engrave metal with a 5.5W visible light laser. I believe what you see in the advertisement is some sort of anneal/oxidize layer that makes it look darker gray. The photo in the video of it used on metal took over 10 hours…

They also left out information, such as interval… pretty critical to heating metals…

In all truth, this is not the right tool for the job … anything using metal will be troublesome with this frequency laser and low power level.

We’ll help you if we can … hands are kind of tied here…

Good luck

:smile_cat:

1 Like
6

Aluminum conducts heat extremely well. Heat is how the laser marks materials. Most projects remove a colored surface from the aluminum, not actually mark the aluminum itself.