I run a small hobby business with a laser engraver.
It is the Vevor 60w C02 laser (I know - not the best around).
It is about 2 years old used maybe 6-10 hours a week & the laser tube has a production date of 2020.
It is perfectly aligned, engraving well although of late have had to go over things twice on the highest power.
Similar to cutting out designs, of late have had to increase the amount of times I am cutting over the ply (3mm)
Unfortunately today it has stopped cutting through entirely.
I believe the tube may need replacing? But I just wanted to get some advice as to whether I can use a 40 or 50W tube as that is all that seems to be available on Vevors website?
I also wondered whether it would be worth changing the lens & mirrors as well?
A good tube should last 10,000 hours, which is about 5 years @ 8 hours/day.
Do you need a 20% power increase or does the 40W work OK for what you do?
When you change a tube…
diameter
length
lps
These need to be identified. Most of these are 50mm in diameter, but as they go up in power the tube must be physically larger in order to accomplish this.
This length of it is a good indicator of it’s power level. My China Blue 50W machine had a 880mm tube in it and produced around 44W with a Mahoney meter…
A 50W tube is about a meter in length, will that fit inside your machine?
The third item is the lps (laser power supply) which is the high voltage tube supply. This has to handle the power needed by your tube…
If all there are compatible, then you should be ok going to a more powerful tube… An lps for a 50W is ok for a 40W tube, but not vice versa…
Have you changed out your coolant? As it picks up ions from metals in the flow path it can degrade, causing weaker output. I change mine yearly. This is a great read about it all: Laser Water Coolants & Additives - LaserGods.com
@Colin has a point, but I doubt it’s what’s happening with yours…
What @Colin describes is the lps supply voltage of about 20 - 30kV going to through the coolant to ground… This can be especially hard on you when any metal touching the coolant goes to a 30kV potential…
I’ve used this in my machine since last August, through a cold (for here) winter…
This is from Cloud Ray and gives you an example of the expected lifespan of these tubes…
Unless Velvor has a special tube made, you can probably ask Cloud Ray the life expectancy of their tubes… I’d buy one of these over one with a 2k hour life expectancy… IMHO…
It’s physical size determines it’s power abilities.
Besides that, it was easy to tell with a watt meter…
