Laser Continually Fires during frame and between moves

Hello,

I’m running a Cloudray 100 Wat power supply M100, a RECI CO2 tube, and a Cloudray Ruida RDC6445S Co2 Laser Controller.

I’ve got Stepperonline DM542T drivers and everything is running great, except the laser continuously fires when I try to frame a project, or when running a project. It won’t fire when I use the move buttons on the Laser Controller, or in Lightburn, but it will fire when I use the “Set laser position by clicking on the page” button.

I’ve triple checked my wiring.
My L-ON1 is connected to L
LPWM1 is connected to IN
Ground to ground.

L-ON1 is set to LOW

When I go to Frame para on the Control Board, the “Frame mode:” is set to “Frame Laseroff”

Everything is brand new, It has less than an hour of use. The powersupply has an included LCD display that will regulate the current, and I’ve tried it both plugged in and unplugged. All with the same results.

I’ve looked at many of the posts that are showing a similar problem, and most of them end with, “a cut setting in LB” but it none of the posts say how they actually got it fixed, even with commentors saying, “tell us how you fixed this”

Thank you for the assistance.

Welcome to the forum… sorry you have a problem.


A little history is always good…

Such as has this ever worked? How we look at troubleshooting it usually begins with this kind of history.

The lps (laser power supply) has a pwm signal to it, that sets the tubes current limit. It should not lase until the L (LOn-1) input goes low.

:smile_cat:

1 Like

Well, considering its all brand new, technically, no, its never worked properly. I built everything based off of “Further Fabrication” youtube series:

I bought his build guide, and most everything as described in his DIY CO2 Laser Cutter / Engraver Build Series. Some of the parts he listed aren’t available anymore, so I got newer or more current models, but pretty much everything is the same specs. I had to tweak my stepper motor settings to reflect my actual stepper motors, but I don’t think that would affect the laser.

I don’t know if he uses Lighburn or not, but when I go to his web page where I bought the instructions from, it states he does “not offer advice or trouble shooting” so that doesn’t do me much good.

So, long story less long. I just got the power supply and tube hooked up, and fired it for the first time today.

I have had a K40 that I bought about six years ago, and put in a smoothieware control board, and I have not had these problems with it. I’ve been running Lightburn exclusively and when I bought the Ruida control board, I bought the license for it, so now I have both.

As I mentioned, I’d check the LOn1 or the L input to see if the lps is being told to lase.

:smile_cat:

Ok, I don’t know how to do that.

Measure the L input, the machine should not lase unless the L input is low. DSP controllers send a pwm continuously during the layer execution and depends on L going low to enable the laser.

If you have a high state L input (laser is not enabled), and it’s lasing, it would point to a bad lps…

Do you have a voltmeter?

:smile_cat:

I do have a voltmeter, but have a very basic understanding of its useage. I know how to turn it on and watch it beep at me. Sorry, I’m not an electrician, but I will do some research on how to use it properly.

I emailed Cloudray about the issue, thinking it might be a power supply problem, they emailed me back and provided this diagram. I add it here in case anyone else might need it.

Looks like a standard lps… but thanks… we know what it is…

Learn how to read voltage… Measure between ground and L, also between ground and IN

Do this when it lasing and it’s not supposed to, so we can tell if the controller is telling it to or it’s the lps.

:smile_cat:

When I hook the voltmeter to L and G, not firing, just sitting there, the voltage bounces between 9-60 Hz.

When I hook the voltmeter between G and IN, it goes up to 72.93 kHz, not firing.

When laser is operating, voltmeter hooked to L and G, it goes up to155 kHz up into the 180s kHz.

When I frame, or “move to”, and the laser is not supposed to fire, the voltmeter reads back up between 120-140 kHz, hooked into L and G.

I tried to take a video, but it got cut off. I can post it if you need to see it.

These are frequencies… what kind of voltmeter do you have?

Post a link to your voltmeter and we can help you with these.

:smile_cat:

https://www.amazon.com/Etekcity-Multimeter-Temperature-Resistance-Capacitance/dp/B07N2GG5L4?source=ps-sl-shoppingads-lpcontext&ref_=fplfs&psc=1&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER

Black is common, red should be plugged into the

image

The dial should be the pulsing dc

image

:smile_cat:

1 Like

Ok, with those voltmeter settings:

When plugged into L and G:
Laser not firing reads 2.07v
Laser when not supposed to fire, reads 2.07v
When supposed to fire, or pulse, .279v

When plugged into IN and G:
Laser not firing reads 0
Not supposed to fire 2.5v
When supposed to fire, or pulse, 2.47v

I also noticed while running some tests, the LCD display that came with the power supply is showing the laser is not firing, when in fact it is. All of my research leads to a bad power supply. I’m going to request a return through Amazon and try again.

I apologize for missing your post…


These voltages are not right. They could be controller or lps issues.

If you’re waiting for another lps… we’ll hang out until you can swap it out…

:smile_cat: