Chinese lasers - they're here !!!

[Rodne Gold]

You can move the head manually , jog the head , set the jog factor , set a co ordinate from home or start in 10 different positions on the job
. . .
. . .
. . .
IE any of those positions relative to the engraving to be done

You can tell it to go back to the start point , home or stay where it finished once the job is done

It uses stepper without feedback , so you cannot pause a job , move the head and then get it to resume , you can just pause.

We tried the 50mm lens I ordered for $22(15mm diameter) in our spirits and it works just fine , even used one of the mirrors , works just fine.
They can give you the lenses in any diameter so one of their cheaper lenses will fit the mercury

Power is limited by tube length , the smaller machines cannot use lets say a 130w tube , unless you have it sticking out somewhere.
I saw the double (top and bottom) die board cutting lasers work , didnt see any very large scale machines working tho.

There are many options
This is what I suggest
1) Uprated chiller if you using an 80-100w tube , from a cw3000 to a cw5000
2) Reci tube and not a cheap glass one
3) Motorised table , not a manual one
4) Red dot pointer to be coincidental with the beam path , the ordinary red dot is just a diode near the head and dioes not go thru the lenses and mirror path
5)18mm lenses and not 15mm ones
6) Knife edge and honeycomb table , get both
7) you get 2 rotarys , you can see em in my pic , buy both , they round $325 for both (1 is $180 the other is $140)
8) Get these spares: tube , tube power supply , a full belt sat , a stepper , 3 mirrors , 2 spare lenses , a 40mm lens , a 50mm lens , a 70mm lens , stepper motor driver , motherboard , led panel , red dot pointer , bearings
9) Tell em to set the machine up so the origin is top left (nearest the beam exit) and not top right
10) Ask them to make a removeable inspection hatch at the left side of the machine where the beam exits , just like on the other side
11) get a stronger blower if they have one
12) throw away their air assist , its rubbish ,you need a much better compressor than they provide
13) They will paint your machine any colour you want , we went blue/grey , but you can have purple/yellow if you want
14) with packing , tell them to put NOTHING on the honeycomb table
15) make sure they get your voltage of your country right
16) be careful of low shipping costs that they quote - rather get your shippers to ship the stuff to you ... not sure of the american way , we just got a FOB price and let our shippers do the rest
17) You generally pay 30% up front and the rest when they ship , I elected to pay it all up front , I am a trusting soul - ended up they owed me $81 for some reason or another , when I was there they wanted top pay me back in cash , I told em to keep it and credit my next order.
You can really be confident dealing with em

Be aware that the bigger the table , the more trouble you will have with it being level , we are making a micro levelling frame , so dont be tempted to go for a massive machine , limit yourself to a 1200x 800 or a 1300 x 900
Also dont be tempted to go for a potent tube unless you intend to do mostly cutting , the more potent the glass tube , even reci's, the less ability you will have to do very low powered engraving , be aware too that these machines arent superspeedsters , so trying to go real fast with higher engraving powers to compensate for the fact the engraver wont fire properly or well at very low power setting wont work that well.
If you want the best balance between engraving and cutting , an 80w reci tube is the answer.

An 80w 1200 x 800 set up with all those "upgrades/options" , including spares and both rotaries shouldnt cost more than $6k

One thing I noticed today with my machines is that they are not completely sealed , they have a slot front and back , almost like a permanent pass thru on the gcc machines , not sure whether that is a blessing or a curse , means I can feed thru long object , but will most likely wreak havoc with exhaust , but easy enough to seal with a strip of perspex. I would either specify or not specify that..depending on what you want.
You cant add the slot if you dont have it , and as I say , easy to seal if you dont want it. You could use a roll to roll feed with the slots if you were cutting rolls of fabric etc.
Heres pics of the "slots"

slot small.jpgslot 2.jpgslot.jpg

[George M. Perzel]

Hi Rodne;
Thanks again for providing a wealth of information and advice. You probably saved me a month of effort - I owe you big time, my friend.
I'm still trying to absorb everything you said and am blown away by the number of different machines and variants on the Shenhui website-awesome.
One quick comment regarding the front and rear slots-ideal for me as I make oversize maps on plywood.Is the slot opening such that I can slide a piece of 3mm ply through the machine with the head in focus
Will a 100watt RECI tube fit in your large machine and is it available?
Best Regards;
George
Laserarts

[Rodne Gold]

George, Im not sure whether the slot will allow head focus as I havent tried it , however I would imagine so as there are 2 ways of focussing , you can move the lens assembly on the head piece up and down or you can use the table up and down, Apart from that , you can use different lenses.
I didnt notice the slots till looking at my pics , I am stopping off at my place today to pick up some stuff , so will check. On looking at my one pic of the small machine in my first posts , it appears the head clears the "slot" , but unlike my bigger machine , there appears to be no slot at the back of my smaller one..
As to the 100w+ tubes , you have to get the 1300 x 900 machine to use it
Heres the Reci site if you want more info on their tubes
http://www.recilaser.com/2010/en/index.html
I asked a lot of questions re power and the balance of delicacy vs power as the difference tween 80w and 150w is not huge money wise , but after lot of thought , decided that the 80w was fine, its still 50w up on my other machines
Most of my work would involve engraving and at most , cutting 10-12mm acrylic on the odd occasion
View it as a sort of decision you would make with an engraver and a cnc router , a big cnc router wont engrave and a small engraver wont route , you can strike a good balance tho.
A lot of the machines on their site are variants on base models with different configurations to suit particular industries , they also tend to advertise the same machine in like 6 different categorys, like textile cutting laser, perspex cutting laser, advertising industry laser, sign making laser and so on.

[Rodne Gold]

Just went into work and looked , seems the slot is a default on all machines , my small one has got a back slot too , and yes , you can slide thick stuff in and maintain focus, plenty clearance for stuff up to maybe 1" or thicker and the table can be raised to support thinner stuff that would bow or sag. I didnt remember seeing it on Vincent de klerks machine as he had blocked his off with some vinyl. Not too sure I will ever use the slots , as I have used pass thru maybe 2-3 x with my Explorers , but its a nice feature to have. I recon one could maybe even adapt a spare stepper plugged into the Y axis as a feed mechanism for a Roll to Roll cutting system if you wanted.
One other thing you must bear in mind is that the big machines are BIG - even the 900 x 600 dwarfs my explorers which have about the same bed size , you must make sure you can actually get them in your premises , I would hate to transport one of these up stairs and they certainly wont fit thru a std doorway.
Nice thing is that they are way easier to work on than the GCC machines as there are latch type hinged hatches all over the things so you can get at components or adjust stuff

[George M. Perzel]

Hi Rodne;
Thanks for info and warning on the size-already told my wife that kitchen area is in jeopardy of being converted since she doesn't seem to use it much anymore...., and that's when the fight started!!
Just received the price list from Shenhui and am blown away- I can buy 8 machines for the price of a Spirit GX and still have enough cash for two weeks in Barbados!
Granted, not quite apples to apples but enough desired features are shared-actually some significant advantages with the Shenhui machines.

Sounds like the slots will work out fine for me.
Are you familiar with double headed systems?
Do they use two separate laser tubes?
Are they strictly for engraving/cutting multiples of the same object or can they engrave halves of a larger image in half the time?
All the videos I have seen seem to show cutting/engraving duplicates.
Did you get both the regular lens and the imported lens? Any apparent difference or too early to tell?
Best Regards;
George
Laserarts

[Rodne Gold]

There are 2 types of double headed systems , one where there is a tube that fires from either side of the machine onto each of 2 heads that move on the gantry and that move in unison , I think the big advantage is doing multiples. You could probably engrave 2 halves of a big graphic IF you can match up the 2 halves exactly , i forsee problems....

The other type has a static head pointing up and one pointing down at each other , the workpiece moves inbetween them and they cut/engave it both from the top and bottom , ie double sided engraving , they seem to use this for die boards and real thick stuff , its a MASSIVE machine. Their 650w YAG metal cutting machine works more or less the same , but only a top noizzle/head , the workpiece moves on this huge bed of spikes , that machine consumes 18kw power and uses gas (02 etc assist) , that is a SERIOUSLY big machine. That have some other lasers there , a big Rofin Sinar and a trumpf they use for making their parts and which are now idle as their yag seems to be the ones they use now , saw it cutting 5mm steel circles , was impressive.

I got the regular lenses , they were real cheap , I looked at the ones I got and cant tell the difference between them and the ones in my GCc machines , I didnt know they had imported ones at the time , had I known that , would have gone for them. My 18mm lenses were $30 - so I bought every focal length they offered
I bought 6 x 15mm lenses as replacements for my spirits. I cant see the imported lenses being THAT much better... but I also dont think they were that much more than the "local" lenses ( I seem to have a figure of $50=70 in my head), so will get a set with my Galvo when it comes.

As to cost comparisons , well the only real issue I saw with a machine with the conventional glass tube (not reci) i that you can't get quite the detail you can with the GCc machines and top engraving speed was about 1/2 or a little more , however the cutting edge quality and smoothness were actually a LOT better then my GCC's. I have no doubt that if Vincents machine , that I saw and "tested' had had it's settings "tweaked" and optimised , it could have done better on the engraving side , but he has one main cutting application and it works very well so hasnt fiddled much , I am intending to optimise big time.

I am also not too sure that all the Corel graphics I have designed with the GCC's in mind will translate flawlessly or without some shuffling around to the new laser , its no biggie to us tho.

When at the factory , I went thru the software and it is almost TOO configureable in terms of fine tuning the machine , you can for example , just for NON cutting movement , set ramp accleration speed , set the linear speed and then independantly set the slow down speed and all that type of thing , it actually could be confusing. I can send you the software manual if you pm me your e-mail.

So getting back to cost , well the machine is so well priced that if it for some reason is a total dog , which it isnt , then you havent lost the farm on it , and even if it really only works a year or 2 and then becomes "worn out" , you just buy another..... $6k for me for a years work is real good value , means the machine costs me round $20 a day and can easily generate 5-10x that a day.

Probably also get a significant amount back when you sell it to the iron scrap merchants , it will most likely be crushed , sent back to china and appear as a kettle or even the casing of your next laser from China.....

I can tell you this , that it is unlikely that I will ever buy a "mainstream" machine again , certainly nothing the size and power of a 1200 x 800 80+w as it just not affordable...

[Jiten Patel]

Incredible post Rodney. I am very very temped to go this route when we are ready to get ourselves a flatbed.

What will you be using your galvo for?

[Rodne Gold]

We are commisioning the lasers as we speak , its not quite as simple as plugging it and pressing start.

For one thing , you have to drill a hole in the ground (we went thru a concrete reinforced floor - took us like 2 hrs with the wrong type of drill)and put in an earth spike and cround the machine chassis to that.

The ducting we use and the ducting supplied are different diameters , so we had a bit of work to do prior to hooking up the exhaust blowers in teerms of reducers and running around for ducting to match our PVC vent pipes.

The chiller supplied with my smaller machine is a piece of sh-t... its a box with an aquarium pump in it , a old capilliary type temp gauge and a stupid fan to blow on the water - you might as well just use a bucket of water and submerge the pump. The Cw 5000 chiller at $350 extra (for the big machine) is another story , that is good kit. Im sorry I didnt go for that one for the small laser , but they said the cheap cw3000 chiller is adequate - we shall see.

Non of the bearings/whatever is lubed , there is some issue sending lube in the package , so we have used white lithium grease to lube em and light oil on the fast moving parts.

The tubes and machine have to be hooked up to the chillers and run for a few hours to remove all trapped air etc.

The tubes have to be put into their tube cradles, have to be hooked up to the low and high voltage leads and adjusted as to alignment, the cradles are like adjustable gymbals so it's fairly easy.
We had to make a hole in the enclosure and the first mirror holder , the reason for this is that we want the red beam pointer and laser to be coincidental - and the way to do this 100% is let both of em shoot out 4-5m and adjust at that point , not essential to do this , but why not? It makes alignment much easier cos you dont need to fire the laser , just use the red dot pointer.

We are also being a little anal and are using laser and digital levels to check and level all the slides , mirror holders , gantrys etc - to the nth degree. doing the same to the main table.

One small problem with my big machines knife blade table , the knives are a touch too thick and need some filing or small grinding to fit into their slots , not too much of an issue , I am not really planning on using this table.

At any rate , we are at the point of actually firing the tubes , which we will do tommorow , all we have to do after that is mirror and red dot alignment (easy) and hook up the puters and test out the software.

I would say its about a 2-3 day job to really get everything perfect. I would NOT recommend this laser to anyone who is a totally 10 thumbed newbie and only wants to press a button , you must be a *little* handy....

We still have some mods but those can wait , the main one being changing the belt drive motorised table to a chain drive.

Jiten , my reasoning behind the Co2 galvo is that we do a ton of plates and smaller item engraving , the galvo is cheap and will take much less time to do lets say 20 small plate and cut em out (of nothing thicker than 1.5mm -more like 0.8mm rowmark flexi type material) than my other machines that scan, freeing them up.
A 200 x 200 marking field will allow me to do lets say 4 columns and 8 rows of plates 45mm x 22mm or the like. Apart from that we manufacture and engrave a lot of wood and acrylic products , using the big lasers to cut thicker stuff and doing the engraving on the galvo for these plaques and awards will also be quick - I have lots of labour , so having someone feed the galvo onsies and lining em up and pressing the button is not an issue. The software to run the galvo is very very good for industrial type engraving , bar coding , serialisation and so forth , opening up a new high speed / high volume marking market for us.
In essence the galvo would be a high speed small item processor - almost 50% of my production falls within "small" items.
At it's price , its well worth taking a chance on...

One of the things that has impressed me is your wedding invites etc , it's a field I would like to explore , however I really do not want to have to start a business model from scratch - its not my core business so would be something of a side line , so here's a suggestion to you..
Perhaps you can sort of establish a franchise or liscence a business package - designs , marketing , paper types , technology etc - I might be interested in something like that .. Im sure there will be many others as well. There are folk here doing similar type things but nothing I have seen touches your stuff...

I recon if you get a flatbed and a small print and cut machine like a roland , you can actually expand your line hugely , full colour printing on vinyl , cloth , paper , larger format cutting and engraving combined with the galvo cut paper and so on , I think for a creative guy like you , the sky is the llimit.

[Ian Franks]

Rodney
I have being sitting quietly in Johannesburg and absorbing your posts. We bought a 50w chinese laser to help with our cupcake wrapper side of the business.
We used to print wedding invites in our print shop but discourage this as our system is not slick enough to deal with them in way that leaves the customer happy. We are considering this again but need the system in place to deal with the endless artwork changes, even had it when the press is running and then there is another change. Then deal with the inevitable thanks for the job can we have a discount.

Are there any SA regulations wrt lasers and emissions that you know of that we should comply with.

[Dan Hintz]

need the system in place to deal with the endless artwork changes, even had it when the press is running and then there is another change. Then deal with the inevitable thanks for the job can we have a discount.

Ouch, Ian... are contracts not handled well where you are? Customers should sign a contract/quote that lays out what they are providing you, what you are providing them, and what charges are involved for any changes. The charge can be based upon time spent fixing things, materials lost, etc. Discounts at the end are a non-starter... you both agreed to a price in the beginning, and asking for a discount after the work has been done should not even be entertained.

[Rodne Gold]

Perhaps there are some regulations in SA, however never heard of them . These lasers we have , albeit being told there are safety interlocks , I can't see em and you can run em open. I would imagine that workmans compensation would give you a hard time if one of your employees got injured due to the laser , either blinded or severely shoicked. I think your biggest risk is HT voltage shocks , albeit if you have a good ground and have insulated the tube terminals , this shouldn't happen , the next risk would be being blinded by a stray beam , however lasering with the lid closed would stop that and other injury. Only real thing I have been able to find is this
http://www.vantagemedifest.com/images/sa_guidelines.pdf
I think with wedding invites , one needs to charge outrageous prices , in the range of R50+ per invite with a minimum job of R1500 ($8 and $200) to take into account the bride , the groom , their parents and relatives who will all want to have a say in the design , colour , texture etc of the invite. Kinda what we call a F Off and Die price ... so high that either you FOAD or if you accept , the profit is worth all the aggro you gonna have to endure do the job
We do certificates and have more or less the same problems , however we print them on a VERY good canon photoquality a3 printer that takes different weights and textures of paper and just design in Corel , normally quite small qtys and no one seems to balk at prices of R25-35 for a run of 20 A4's , even better , we often frame them in some way or another , this adds substantially to the profit. We just e-mail a proof and get the customer to sign off , once it's approved , it takes a few minutes to do the run. If the customer changes artwork after signing off , they pay again.

[Ian Franks]

Ouch, Ian... are contracts not handled well where you are? Customers should sign a contract/quote that lays out what they are providing you, what you are providing them, and what charges are involved for any changes. The charge can be based upon time spent fixing things, materials lost, etc. Discounts at the end are a non-starter... you both agreed to a price in the beginning, and asking for a discount after the work has been done should not even be entertained.

Dan
We always give a written quote, just weddings are very emotional for the families. Now we only print if we get the artwork. It just creates too much tension if we do it any artwork. For our normal customers they understand signing off a proof. We never entertain discounts once the job is finished just this does get to you. That is why you have to be very slick upfront.

[Jiten Patel]

Rodne, I am flattered mate. our business model is pretty strong, but is still in development and I don't think we are business savvy enough YET, to franchise our brand out. Also we want to build the brand into a name which is known and develop the product line before we take any moves like that. but when we do, you will be the first to know.

Ian, weddings are very emotional. We deal with Brides (or bridezillas sometimes) all day long. You have to be extremely calm and patient and explain all the options and go through everything with a fine tooth comb. We have so many options, sometimes it's mind boggling. 180 different card types and colours, 100's of design options and sizes and styles and and and and and! So before we go to print or laser anything, we are for a 50% non-refundable deposit with the remainder being paid before shipping or collection.

Rodne is right, you do have to charge quite high prices, but saying that, laser-cutting doesn't come cheap and it looks incredible, so therefore warrants the price tag. Our average order ranges from £500-700 and our highest order so far has been £5000 with the lowest being £200. It's all about marketing though. You can have the cure for cancer, but if no one knows it exists, what's the point!

[Rodne Gold]

Jiten , I think you have a emminently marketable product right now , the only issue you really have to consider is if promulgating your package cuts your own throat , IE takes your own business away. Its very difficult to "wholesale" and retail as well. However we also have the same problem with some of my materials and products , and if I do supply wholesale , I only really supply outside my area and do tell those that I supply to that I "retail" in my catchment area.
As you rightly said , having a product without marketing is like winking at a woman in the dark , only you know what you are doing , thus if you do "franchise" you have to really provide a business and marketing plan.

We have test fired our lasers today , havent hooked up the software yet , but have done all the alignment (which for us was a snap , as we often align our other machines , so are well used to the procedure , basically the same on all lasers.)

I have includes some pics of some lines that indicates the spot sizes of 'em , we tested both chinese machines , the 1200 x 800 reci 80w tubed and the 900 x 600 ordinary 80w glass tubed machines at the WORST point on the table , bottom right , the part furthest from the beam.

Watching the tube while the laser is on is kinda like Star trek stuff , you see the beam of rose/purple light in the tube , luke walker and light sabres come to mind.

The light line was done by the reci tubed machine at 20% power , the 2 darker lines were the chinese lasers at 70% power , the 2 small squares were done on our 30w RF synrad tubed spirits at the closest place to the beam


As you can see the spot sizes are EXTREMELY acceptable , this is a macro shot and has been resampled for display so results don't show that well , however by eye (and with a 10x loupe) it can be seen that the low powered (20%) reci's tube output is the same if not a bit finer than the RF tubes , the higher powered reci (70%) is a little better than the "cheap" 80w tube and is wider than the spirits at 70% power , however 70% power on the spirits is 20w , while 70% on the reci is 50+ w and the heat affected zone is larger.
All in all , far better than I expected for "cheap chinese glass tubed" machines.
I will post a lot more results , niggles , glitches , pros and cons in the next few days - but things look very promising.

[Dan Hintz]

Rodney,

Awaiting burn results from your galvo unit...




Jit, you have a PM...