LaserUser.com Forum (formerly RDWorksLab)

Hi everybody. I have made my own CNC machines for 20+ years. I also make box-making machines (click in a few numbers and get the size, shape and type of cardboard box you want in about 1 minute). I used to machine all the parts, but after I saw a laser work, I decided a lot of parts could be laser-cut. I also made Doodlebots (3-axis CNC machines for kids to build). They had 50 parts and a laser was the only way to make them fast and cheap. My makerspace closed and I lost my access to lasers, as did about 800 other people.

I will be building a laserfor sale to one of the makerspace refugees. I am thinking 48" x 32", 40 Watts and $2,500.

My machine will be 64" x 48", 100 Watts, compressor chiller. I ordered a Ruida controller so I can take advantage of this site and all of the RDworks Learning Labs videos.

My laser will be making lots of parts for my next generation box making machines.

I intend to be an active member of this site as I have found that the more I put into something, the more I get out of it.

Welcome John- you are in good company here, Tim is designing his own laser and I believe we now have a laser builders sub-forum. It would be a service to the membership if you could chronicle your build as I think this will be more and more popular. Gene

John Osborne wrote: Sun Nov 24, 2019 I will be building a laserfor sale to one of the makerspace refugees. I am thinking 48" x 32", 40 Watts and $2,500.

i can't understand why you would limit to 40W when doing a custom build. a 80W laser is not really more expensive and can do much more in term of cutting... there are very few cases where 80W would prove "too much", especially if you use dot-mode when cutting thin materials like paper. on the contrary, the 40W will always be too slow for much cutting jobs (where you set at max power and fastest speed that cuts through)

40W is for the K40 on a budget only, in my opinion, as with 48" large you can fit a large tube in your machine-to-be that would definitely not fit in a k40.

I am building a 48" x 32", 40 Watt because that is what my customer wants. It will have features that take it out of the K40 class.