Okay so for some reason, my laser won’t cut poster board or cardboard anymore when it used to work just fine. I thought maybe I accidentally changed a setting, so I opened a known saved file where I had cut poster board before and it still won’t work. I’ve never tried it with my IR laser head so I changed them out and tried that but still nothing. I need this to make a template that’s fairly time sensitive so I’d appreciate any help you can give me. I attached the file for the known good cut in the past.
The only change I’ve made to the machine is updating to 1.7.01 for what that’s worth. I have verified focal length, tried cardboard as well as poster board, made sure lens was clean, used air assist, material test, all that. The laser is on (blue light showing) but nothing happening. HEEEEEELLLLLLLP MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!! Lou’s AC Bezel.lbrn2 (15.3 KB)
Yes ti clean lens, and yes to constant power with the IR laser. I thought the diode was supposed to never use constant power mode, was I wrong about that?
Constant power means the laser power will not taper off as it slows down. When cutting corners. you do not want this to happen. Except when scanning images, I almost always use constant power. I have not messed up anything with it yet.
I typed that in but nothing happened. The machine is running right now so could that be why? For what it’s worth, I run the IR laser to do custom engraved hockey pucks for my son’s team and others and it’s working flawlessly for that operation. So it’s not like the laser isn’t working. I’ve done 4 pucks today with zero issues, then I try paper and it won’t touch it. VERY strange.
It’s kind of an off white, but I’ve cut it with the machine many times before (I’m even using the same piece I cut something out of previously with no problems. I also tried cardboard which I have cut a lot of in the past with no problems and yet it won’t cut. I’m completely lost here
OK. Please copy and paste the output of $$ in the console window like @MikeyH mentioned; any, yes, you’ll have to wait until the machine is idle before you can do so.
You see that $30 & $31 at the right of your image? That is in the Console display window. There is a list of numbers with $ in front of them. We need all of that,
Have you been changing parameters? These are not in line with what is typical for a diode gantry, or leadscrew, machine.
$110 = Normally $110 and $111 are the same. I expect it would be 6000mm/m. Doubling this parameter does not mean it can go twice as fast.
$121= Is very low compared to $120. I think this would prevent your laser from coming up to full speed and thus force a power reduction with variable power. Maybe set both to 1000mm/m and see if things improve.
You now have the GRBL parameter list. Copy it to a text file and put it in a safe place.
If these changes get you back in business, we can talk about other parameters that look strange.
