Options for laser power meters

[Bill George]

Does it give readings consistent with what you expected?

[Don Corbeil]

I emailed the seller and got a very confusing answer about what attachment comes with the meter. They claim 5% accuracy the list of attachments for sale with the meter had no power or other details... just a bunch of part numbers and they don't cross over to anything on the website.

Yes, it took a while of emailing back & forth to get the information I needed, including photos & part numbers. I eventually had a full list of the probes w/part numbers and photos and I ran these by the Macken tech, who identified them. That gave me some confidence in going ahead, as well as the 14 day refund window. Given the time difference, that also made the process slow. I should be getting mine by early next week, so I'll update here when I do.

[Don Corbeil]

Received the macken today, and everything looks good. New probe, and the meter appears to be working properly.
I have a rather simple question for those with a trotec: How do you set up your trotec to get a meter reading? Is there a key function that will send a beam at 100% power for as long as you need to maintain it? I tried setting up a 1" spiral pattern (in cut mode, lens removed) centered on the probe that lasted 20 seconds (the time required on the macken), but I'm not sure that's the best way to take a reading on the speedy 300. For testing at the laser head, what distance do you have your probe from the head? Any suggestions?

[Dave Sheldrake]

Keep the beam still Don and the meter fixed if possible or you will get some funky results

[Lee DeRaud]

...rather than a well intentioned bodger with some super glue and a $3 ebay cooking thermo

Ok, now I feel a lot better about springing for the fancy $16 thermometer from Williams-Sonoma.
I've got a 3oz lead wheel weight, what flavor epoxy do you recommend to attach it?

[Dave Sheldrake]

The three most important words in the English language: "Front Towards Enemy".

What really worries me is I know what that means

[Lee DeRaud]

What really worries me is I know what that means

What really worries me is that they thought they needed that instruction.

[TAMI WILSON]

I just got my Mahoney power meter. As many of you know Trotec was here last week and replaced my tube. When the tech was here he ran one of those $1000 power meters on my machine and his first reading was 98 watt the second was 103 watt. I just ran my mahoney meter and got pretty much the same reading. I am happy i spent $100 rather than $1000. For me it is working just fine.

[Don Corbeil]

What I'm looking for on my 300 is the key press/sequence to hold a steady full power beam for as long as you hold the key for testing purposes. The rep showed me this when he tested mine at setup. but I've since forgotten

[TAMI WILSON]

it is the shift arrow and the one right beside it it points down then left. you have to use magnets to lock out the lid though. with my mahoney meter i had to hold for 17.5 seconds. the 300 only pulses for about 12 so i had too quickly press it again

[Don Corbeil]

it is the shift arrow and the one right beside it it points down then left. you have to use magnets to lock out the lid though. with my mahoney meter i had to hold for 17.5 seconds. the 300 only pulses for about 12 so i had too quickly press it again

Ah, that's it, the dual button press. I also realized that I had to go into JC settings and make sure the power pulse setting was at 100%
Thanks Tami for the reminder.
All is good, tube is putting out just shy of 87 Watts.

Very happy to have scored a Macken digital meter & probe for $150!

[Travis Reese]

Don, I found the same power meter you ordered listed by the same seller you ordered from. I was looking at about the time you started this thread. I was worried maybe it was some kind of scam since you had obviously bought the meter the seller had listed. He told me that he had a second one and thus the new listing. I too was worried about the probe descriptions since they didn't correlate to anything on the Macken site. Apparently what the seller was putting in the auction description for the probes was actually the calibration data, not the probe model. I ordered this second one he had listed. It finally arrived today with two probes for measuring 20w-100w lasers. Anxious to see how well it works.

[Travis Reese]

Finally got home and tested this thing out. I have an EFR 1200CL laser tube in my machine. It's rated at 60 watts nominal 70 watts max at 22ma according to the manufacturer's web site. The people at Rabbit obviously did a nice job of setting up the machine since at 100% power I'm reading just over 21.5ma on the ammeter I put in. I've read where some are set such that they're overdriving the tube at 100%. Being that the power meter I got came with two probes I was able to test one probe against the other. I wrote a program that moved the head at .1 mm per sec on a 2mm line to give me 20 seconds of exposure. I timed it to be sure it came out right and as near as I can tell it's 20 seconds on the dot which is what the meter requires. The first probe read 71.8 watts and the second one read 71.7 watts. At least their seems to be some consistency. I think this will be a very handy little tool.

[Don Corbeil]

Finally got home and tested this thing out. I have an EFR 1200CL laser tube in my machine. It's rated at 60 watts nominal 70 watts max at 22ma according to the manufacturer's web site. The people at Rabbit obviously did a nice job of setting up the machine since at 100% power I'm reading just over 21.5ma on the ammeter I put in. I've read where some are set such that they're overdriving the tube at 100%. Being that the power meter I got came with two probes I was able to test one probe against the other. I wrote a program that moved the head at .1 mm per sec on a 2mm line to give me 20 seconds of exposure. I timed it to be sure it came out right and as near as I can tell it's 20 seconds on the dot which is what the meter requires. The first probe read 71.8 watts and the second one read 71.7 watts. At least their seems to be some consistency. I think this will be a very handy little tool.

Travis, glad you were able to pick one up, too (and two probes!). Sounds like you are also getting consistent results with yours. All in all it was a great find and I'm quite pleased. Now and then some great finds pop up on ebay, but it takes a lot of due diligence to minimize the risk.

[Travis Reese]

Yep, I was pretty skeptical but he responded that he had two of them and the one I was bidding on was the last one he had. I took a leap of faith. He had good feedback.