LightBurn camera & mount improvement recommendations

I’m not sure if LightBurn staff and engineers monitor this forum or not, but I’ll give this a shot and see if they respond to me. Based on my experience, I have only 2 issues with the LightBurn camera and mounts.

Issue No. 1: The camera focus ring is very loose within the body of the camera itself. It is the ONLY component that is loosely fitted, everything else is really solid. Even the slightest bump of the lid will cause the camera to go out of focus & alignment. I am extremely gentle and love my lasers (both of them). My machines weigh about 400lbs and the other one is about 900lbs. Both are rock solid machines, no loose fittings, rattling, shaking, vibrations, etc… Absolutely nothing moves on these machines unless it’s designed to move. Even the lids are very sturdy, no sloppy hinges, lift mechanisms are strong and no sloppiness when raising or lowering the lid. BUT sometimes, even closing the lid will jar the camera focus ring ever so slightly, causing my view of the work bed/material to become instantly out of focus and alignment. Because the focus ring is so loose, turning the lens to refocus is problematic because just when you think it’s in focus, you move your finger and BAM! its out of focus again and another camera realignment is needed too.

I have no doubt that others have the same experience. Chime in if you do.

Issue No. 2: Anyone that has mounted their camera, knows how difficult it is to actually mount the camera in the perfect position, the first time. The camera mount itself is fairly solid, no real movement there. The vertical adjustment (aiming the camera towards the front or rear of the laser bed) works fairly well too. But, the lack of any type of horizontal adjustment in the camera mount is a design flaw in my opinion. I used industrial double sided tape the first time I mounted the camera, but due to the lack of horizontal adjustment feature, I had to move it ever so slightly to the left. Took me 30 minutes to carefully remove the mount from the lid without damaging the lid or the camera & mount. Now, I use the 3m removable tabs. They are kind of spongy, but makes repositioning the mount a helluva lot easier and safer.

Recommended upgrades: (I’ll be standing in line to buy one)

Upgrade 1: The focus ring on the camera itself needs to be tighter to eliminate any movement of the lens. It’s much too loose and causes a LOT of lost time having to realign the camera.

Upgrade 2: The base of the camera mount that attaches to the machine lid, should be longer with a locking U-channel that allows the camera to slide from side to side. Add a hex screw to lock it in place at the best position. Additionally, I recommend 3 sizes available. 4", 6", and 10" long versions will give options for small to large machines. This feature allows the user to mount the camera in a position that is as close as possible. Then, you can fine tune the camera view of the bed without having to remove the mount and reposition it again. Once you have the camera in it’s very best physical position, then you can use the camera control settings to fine tune a near perfect view of your machine bed.

LightBurn may or may not accept these recommendations, but if there are any independent designers out there who’d like to make one, I’ll buy one from you. I have no doubt you’d make a boat load of money :slight_smile:

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We do monitor and participate with our forum community, yes. :wink: Thank you for this feedback and consideration. We like feedback, so much so that we have a specific site dedicated to Feature Request (look to the upper-right of every page on this forum). We use this information to help prioritize the efforts, based on community voting and support of a given idea shared there. Thank you again for sharing this feedback. :slight_smile:

Awesome! Thank you for responding so quickly. Actually, I kept browsing around and I did find the feedback / suggestion forum and I submitted my recommendation there.

I hope it gets a LOT of votes :slight_smile:

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