A little about me

[Matthew Beiers]

Hi All,

I'm a design and furnishings high school teacher in Brisbane, Australia.
Our school has 2 red Chinese laser cutters, a 130w with a bed of 1390 x 900 and a 60w with a bed 650 x 500.

The 130 w gives us no end of problems, seems to lose its mirror alignment at least once a month, which is odd because we don't move it, but I think it shakes it's self-loose, because when we do scan's on it the whole machine gets a shimmy and a shake going. Our 60w is a dream to use it runs so well, we never really have problems with it, I think our tube is on its way out, it every now and then it stops working when it is being smashed by a class, I've found we just need to turn off the laser power switch (not the whole machine) for a minute and back on and it starts working again, it is the original tube in it from when we bought it, so it has done well, I'm surprised it had lasted this long.

I'm like most people who get these machines, we have no training and learn from trial and error and just want to join to help others and lean things from others.

Cheers
Matt.

[Pete Cyr]

Welcome Matt. Is you 130w machine a floor mount or table top. If a floor mount I would check fasteners assembling the case/frame tight. If table top perhaps the table is not sturdy enough.

[Matthew Beiers]

Hi Pete,

It’s a floor mount on wheels with screw down legs that are down so the wheels are off the floor. My biggest problem is finding time to try to sort it out, I’m teaching 90% of my time at work.

[Gene Uselman]

Hi Matt- I would like to see picts of the 1300mm machine. I have a 1300x900 and do a lot of engraving and cutting and it is rock solid. Also the mirrors going out of alignment seems odd- I check mine every year or so out of shame because it needs [and gets] so little maintenance. A machine that big need a serious cabinet for support. And welcome, and bless you for teaching the young'uns technology which I consider very important. Gene

[Matthew Beiers]

Hi Gene and Peter,

I got some time to do a check of our 130w and found out who ever had tried to align the mirrors before didn't tighten up the locking bolts so that's why I think the mirrors have moved. I found my main problem was the mirror above the lens was way off and the laser was hitting the inside of the cone, after adjusting that and all the other mirrors (Still not 100% as I was doing it while trying to teach and get it finished so kids could use it in the lesson) it is running nice now, cutting 3mm acrylic in the front right hand corner (furthest away from the laser) at 34mm/s.
So happy with that, next week when the kids finish I hope to find some time to just go back and fine tune it more and get everything spot on.

I found these images on the CNC zone forum which helped a lot.

vertical Alingment.jpg

Mirror Alingment.jpg

Laser Tube alignment.jpg

Matt.

[Pete Cyr]

Watch this video

viewtopic.php?f=141&t=4036#p22485