Hello all, Hope you all had a great Christmas!
I had some computer issues starting with Lightburn and my older laptop. I still have an issue but it is useable.
Any way for my first burn I tried using an Alvin the chipmunk image.
Ran it 200mm/min and 100% power. I had the following result.
I am a total NOOB with lasers and have don no testing as of yet, but felt I should have gotten better results than the above. Please let me know what I can do for better results.
Thank you,
Eric
“IF” you layers are set up right, don’t run gcode. Use start.
Two suggestions:
Start was used.
Thank you for your input.
Thank you for your reply, yes, I ran it as a line to try and save time. I’ll give fill a try.
I’ve rerun it for better results.
What I want…
What I got using fill…
Again this is 200mm/sec at 100% power.
From here what should I use for testing material settings as a 4.2 laser?
Min/Max Speed?
Min/Max Power?
How many Columns and Rows?
I’m looking for a starting point, As I said I am a complete NOOB where lasers are concerned.
I really appreciate the assist here. Very Much!
Eric
In general I’d suggest not running your laser at 100% power as it may shorten the life of the laser. For a material test it may be work including it.
Since you already have a notion that 200 mm/s at 100% power is too low for this type of engraving on this material I’d suggest using 200 mm/s as the upper end of speed for your tests. Go down to at least 100 mm/s with power ranges down to 50%. Once you see how that performs you could go even slower at lower ranges of power if you’re not satisfied with what you get otherwise. Much of this is trial and error.
Repeating this over time will give you a feel for how your laser performs.
Thank you for your insight. I’ll do just that.
From the vendor, they claim
fastest feedrate of 200 inch per minute
Am I daft or is that a maximum of 3.33 in/s or 85mm/s…?
In my normal state of confused…
200mm/m = 7.87in/m
or 0.131in/s that makes it 3.33mm/s
25.4 being the factor used for converting mm to in and visa versa,
The link you used is for Shapeoko the CNC for Routing not lasering.
I understood this to be the maximum speed of the head… Sorry, just thought I’d ask… something wasn’t adding up… to me. Thanks for clarifying…
I have my laser attached to my Shapeoko Pro XXL. I’m too cheap to pay for a whole new machine.
Got it…
Try a more homogenous type or cut of wood. Whatever that is (white oak?), the denser (I suspect) growth rings aren’t playing nice with your laser. You might try dropping the speed by half, but I suspect that will adversely the affect the softer areas.
People seem to have pretty good luck with plainsawn or peeled veneer cherry and maple. Basswood is the defacto cheap training wood. Pine ply is probably decent, too, but I haven’t tried.
I spoke with the gentleman who sold me the laser and he asked about a couple settings, one regarding running laser at full power capability. I look to test it out later this afternoon.
Looks REALLY good! What was the fix?
Under device settings I had the S-Value Max set at 1000. I changed it to 24000, and well, Ta-Da!
Does this match the value for $30 in GRBL configuration? If not, you’ll probably have a bad time.
Do you have a non zero value in $31?
all for the assistance! Great Forum to be a part of.