Title. What is the worst case scenario if your mirrors are severely misaligned, or removed entirely while operating a co2 laser cutter?
Please be more specific. Where are you going with this question?
“Worst case scenario” is quite broad especially when you’re providing no context as to how this question is to be interpreted.
I’m not sure how else to express it? If one of the mirrors is missing or so out of alignment that they are not “connecting”, what’s the worst case scenario? Eg, fire.
The problem with the term “worst case scenario” is that it’s not bounded. And it’s unclear for what characteristic you’re measuring (e.g. affect on burn quality, focus, etc.).
This also is dependent on many factors including the housing of your laser.
But let’s take one example. If you ran the laser, and M1 was missing. And for some reason you had an access port or door directly across from the laser exit. Let’s say that the laser is allowed to pass through the machine chassis through the port and was burning a wall of the building. And let’s say that while you were busy focusing on something else and the laser was dutifully firing and the walls catch fire. Now you’re dealing with a building fire.
Another scenario… mirrors are misaligned and happen to redirect the laser through one of the open holes on the machine. You’re standing directly in the line of travel and your eyes are exposed to the beam. You’re now blind.
The stakes are high.
The question is better asked, under the best case scenario, what happens if the mirrors are missing. In that case, let’s say you’re very lucky and you catch it quickly. The are no exposed areas of the chassis. The laser did not reflect from the inner chassis wall onto any critical components, and did not cause significant damage. Consider yourself lucky and fix the situation with the mirrors.
These machines deserve a tremendous amount of respect.
That answers my question, thank you.
(I’m still not sure what the question was)
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Hi.
^This.
Exactly the same requirement of respect goes for diode lasers as well, even though the beam manipulation by mirrors etc. is thankfully out of our reach, = less chances of effing up big time.
Any reflected or scattered portion of a beam of even the puniest one of the diode laser family is enough to blind You forever if the worst comes to worst.
The possibility of something catching fire with a reflected low power diode laser beam is less likely to happen, but by no means impossible either.
Regards,
Sam
I’ve changed out the actual mirror mounts. When adjusting from m2 to m3, it wasn’t hitting the mirror… the beam was going over the head, since the lid was open it was going out of the machine and hitting the sheet rock about 4 ft away.
Couldn’t see any damage to anything. I stuck a 2x4 in there to see where it was going, it was so far off… No damage to anything…
Of course what makes a laser really work is the lens. I haven’t done it but I’ve seen people on Youtube stick their finger into the beam before m3. It was like a cigarette burn… I’m not that stupid.
I’ve seen mirror that got so hot the cooked off the reflective area… the heat goes somewhere… in this case the mirror. The mount was warm but not affected.
I keep a co2 extinguisher on hand, near whatever machine I’m using.
This is likely a function of distance and time. The beam is of course diverging with distance but with adequate time I’m sure this could have done considerable damage. I assume you were doing test pulses? The fact that the beam can instantly mark alignment targets is proof enough that a fire is not only possible but likely. At least sheetrock is lower on the scale of flammability.
Let me say, so we don’t get off track I believe in safety. I wear safety glasses habitually. I also put my risks in proportion, relative to other dangerous things I have to live with.
I don’t believe in scare tactics, an educated person knowing the truth is much safer than someone using these while engaged in fearful operations.
It’s not really true that once the eye is damaged it’s lost forever. This may apply to visible light lasers, which damage the retina for which there is no fix. An ir machine damages the cornea, which can be replaced, albeit by surgery. So on a scale of being dangerous, it’s the low cost visible light lasers that pose the greatest threat to eyesight.
Give me some credit, I’m aligning it after maintenance. I didn’t move the mirror holders and run a job expecting it to be fine… I wouldn’t expect you to do this either.
We rarely if ever talk about the emission from the actual laser doing it’s job where it produces an extremely wide range of emissions from ir to over the UV spectrum. Since a co2 and a fiber are invisible to the human eye and every laser within this scope I’ve seen operate produces a very brilliant spot, even with safety equipment, clearly indicating that these lasers produced light isn’t the only block of frequency being emitted at high energy levels. Many are as dangerous to your eyesight along with the fact that common eye protection used, make most eye protection useless for these frequencies.
I check my machine, but avoid watching the lasers operation since I know it damages my eyes. It’s rather mesmerizing and difficult not to watch. And I don’t hear a word about these kind of dangers.
What I’m advocating is that we, as a group, instill understanding and use of these in a safe way without the soap box speeches of blindness, death and being maimed for life fear tactics that are constantly parroted.
I have no issue advising that you can damage your vision, but jumping to blindness and death is rather harsh and does more damage from fear instead of instilling the knowledge that keeps people safe.
From a number of years following and searching, I see no evidence of these claims actually occurring… even in at very low numbers, including the people who probably shouldn’t own one.
I’d speculate that you have a much greater chance of being maimed or killed every time you get in your vehicle …
I’d be very surprised if these hobby lasers were anything at all compared to the acceptable vehicular collisions or resulting deaths…
Just my opinion… 
I think we must be responding to different understanding of the topic. The question was asked broadly, what is the worst case scenario?
It seems you’re saying the worst case scenario is not so bad. Or that’s how it would be interpreted in isolation.
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Their username is single question theyre probably writing an article for a blog or getting info for a vlog.
100% agreed… I’d add extremely to broadly.
If you own a car, you should know, not only how to drive it, but also the rules of the road. This isn’t any different…
Maybe I should have stated the worst possibility is being blinded, your house catches on fire which spreads to your neighbor and then throughout the city… and the whole town burns down killing many innocent people… It is possible… however very unlikely.
I don’t think that is a realistic approach… even with such a broadly worded question. Most of these comments are possible, but many are very unlikely, much like my absurd scenario of burning down the whole town.
So a better answer is that the beam has energy, whatever it strikes will be absorbed, reflected or a combination of these two…
I would hope they know any biological entity could be harmed by a strike from this energy field.
I think we all want people to use these in a safe and productive environment with no injuries, only joy.
You are as creative as you are incorrect. Thanks again to the user who answered my question without fantasizing about their own context. I’m not really sure what was so confusing about it.
Wise words. And widely applicable.
This Topic has run its course. Closing now.
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