Hi Everyone, I’m somewhat of a newbie when it comes to laser engraving so please be gentle. Today I took delivery of my Aliexpress generic JPT MOPA M7 80w machine and got straight to playing. I’m already loving Lightburn, but have a few questions:
It seems that lightburn will only detect and use my machine if I use the Lightburn USB drivers, and ezcad will only detect my machine if I use the drivers provided on the USB stick that came with my machine. Is this normal?
When I use lightburn and import the device settings from ezcad I dont think its importing the ones correct for my machine. Settings like the frequency dont have anywhere near the correct range that the laser is capable of. It does sort-of work, but not anywhere near as well as ezcad.
Are there any settings someone can provide to get me up and running properly? Here is my current ones:
Drivers for EZCad will not work with Lightburn. If you want to switch between EZCad and Lightburn you have to swap drivers.
These are from my 60W JPT M7 MOPA – it has a loaded cor file for the lens and I have all of my delays set to zero… I wouldn’t suggest that for you. I think it’s pretty common for these to be half done configuration. They didn’t even tell me step/rotation for my rotary.
Thanks so much for those settings, I’ll give them a try. I also got a rotary and the foot pedal but haven’t even attempted to get them working yet.
With regards to the lightburn material test settings, I found that window of settings just as intimidating as the laser setup. Do you have any pointers for what would work best and get me some nice colour tests on a sheet of brushed stainless steel?
Laser Everything has some libraries they used to keep locked down for paid subscribers, they are good people. The libraries are apparently supplied at no cost along with software to adjust from their 30W machine to your 80W machine.
I also suggest one of their videos for photo engraving, mainly because it’s excellent in description of how this is used but also how to pick the best interval for any material and any laser.
Some of the things your doing may violate some of the videos suggestions, but it’s because you’re heating the material for a color change.
I was always under the idea that it lasted until the metal was heated.
February will be two years for me with the fiber … I still have a dog tag that’s held it colors and on my kitchen knives… of course the knives are black but still not engraved.
Thanks again everyone for all your help. This is my first test on a stainless steel business card. I got some colour but also a lot of squares of nothing.
Based on this what tests should i attempt next? I did try to hone in on a colour but ended up warping the stainless steel business cards
You’re hitting one of the things that make it more difficult to achieve.
The oxidized or annealed area is directly related to heat… so it’s a delicate balance between enough heat and not warping the material. Since metals conduct heat much quicker than most natural materials, a change in thickness will result in a change of color (or none at all) on something that can conduct heat away. Copper it pretty tough to get what you want because of it sinks heat away very quickly.
I pick a the square that is closest to what I want… then adjust the mix/max or other variable to bracket the desired results…
This is kinda what I was starting to worry about. If the colour varies between material thicknesses (and I also assume distance from the laser), isn’t it almost impossible to get reproducible results?
For example if someone comes to me and wants an extra large stainless steel water bottle engraved in a blue colour, wont it be impossible for me to achieve this without having a sacrificial bottle to try it on first?
