needing help

[Keith Winter]

Pretty standard 60w max 50w actual. That part would be normal, other part is not. Bill has given you some good places to start checking.

yes I have skills to do this, I have ran over all connections, check as much as I could before coming here, to ask for any type of help, the crazy thing is the laser tube- it shows 60w but the tube length that I can find is 50w -- 1000 mm tube length. I checked length it shows either 39.5 or 40 inches trying to do it myself. The power system if you hit test fire for it alone it will fire tube for about 3 to 5 seconds after that the tube will do nothing, if you turn laser of wait 5 to 10 minutes turn back on then again you get 3 to 5 secs of laser to fire then dead again until you turn off then back on.

If you look at photos I included you see the power supply - i have to unplug the bottom plug to get laser to fire at all, if I let it set for a few days , plug everything back in I can fire laser for a few seconds for control panel, then it stops and turn off machine, unplug plug turn on then fire tube 3 to 5 secs.

[Robert White]

Robert If you have a voltmeter or multi meter that would help. I get all my parts from Lightobject dot com they will have tubes and power supplies.

Even with the hot glue strung across the connections they can still be loose screws, check all of them.
Do you have water flow through the tube?
Is the ground wire to the tube connected at the end where the first mirror is ?
Is the red heavy wire to the tube connected?
Start with the basics first.

YES all wires are connected to tube, this isn't my first laser, First paper weight, but I triple checked wires , leads , plugs connections ground wires to and from machine, water was running , no bubbles

[Matt McCoy]

I'll mention again that is is likely the power supply. A quick test is to run a long vector cut at max power. If you can no longer see evidence of vaporization of the material (not even a mark) the power supply to the tube has probably failed. If you can still engrave an image, you might look at replacing the tube. However, a bad PS can take out the tube as well.

[Dave Sheldrake]

Ummm that beam in the tube isn't a beam...it's a high voltage generated plasma. You can't actually see the laser beam inside a CO2 tube. The metal rings at each end are just electrodes, it's not at all unusual to see the plasma going between them (in fact it's a requirement for the tube to work)

Looking at the colour in the video I'd suggest it is firing at too high a current causing saturation and failure due to the lack of available gas (gain medium) to sustain the lase (it's a very white plasma)

At 1,000mm that's a 50 watt tube, 60's are 1200mm long (in 55mm diameter size)

Given that the JG60 PSU will fire at up to 24/25mA so more than enough to overheat and kill a 50 watt tube and has probably been over adjusted at the supplier to give a higher than safe power.

Without knowing what residual current is at the negative end of the tube it's not possible to say exactly which is at fault, the tube, the PSU or both

[Bill George]

I did peanut test that someone advised off CNC it worked if I hit test fire on Power Supply the shipping peanut would attach to the HV red power supply wire, but one the power supply would not light the shipping peanut would not, turn off machine with 3 to 5 minutes turn back on guess what 3 to 5 sec peanut would attach to HV line once it quit nothing from peanut. not tube fire. turn off wait turn on fire 3 to 5 secs tops

Also may not be anything- controller board I have a blinking light on line 14

Did you follow that Link? Info in the video also. The reason I stressed the HV connection, especially the the ground because it seems like the beam is wandering inside the tube.

[Bill George]

You need to also post the part number of the controller card to find out about that warning light. Plus the fact the tube will only fire with the test button is another symptom that will need to be addressed.

Does the motion control system work?

[Matt McCoy]

Maybe too late, but return shipping must be paid by the seller when an item is "Not as Described" on Ebay. You also might take a another look through the return policies for the machine you purchased. If you used a credit card through Paypal, I would contact your issuer. Shipping a heavy package back to China for a refund is leverage to prevent returns.

[Matt McCoy]

Sorry -- one other thing. It is also against Ebay's TOS to misrepresent where the item is shipping from. If there is a discrepancy in where the item is listed to ship from and the location it actually ships, it is violation of Ebay's policy, I believe. Here's more info:

http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/item-location.html

[Bill George]

So Robert, what have you found?

[Robert White]

OK so I got digging around, triple checked all wires, connections, which all was tight!!!!!!! So then I go to power supply for laser open it up started looking for bad solders, loose connections, and guess what I found ????????? there is a circuit board on the inside of power supply that has a bad solder joint- I could move it in a way the laser would fire each and every time, then let it rest, and laser would do nothing, no noise no test fire. more it just a little Bang the laser fired. So I just got home from work and going to re-solder the joint and be back in business, Thank god. Then I can work on tube.


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[Bill George]

Excellent news! I had a small Chinese made milling machine....same thing. They get in a hurry putting those things together and crappy solder will do it every time. You might not need a tube, but I got one last time from my source Lightobject dot com, just make sure you measure correctly.

[Bert Kemp]

I refer back to post #10

[Doug Griffith]

OK so I got digging around, triple checked all wires, connections, which all was tight!!!!!!! So then I go to power supply for laser open it up started looking for bad solders, loose connections, and guess what I found ????????? there is a circuit board on the inside of power supply that has a bad solder joint- I could move it in a way the laser would fire each and every time, then let it rest, and laser would do nothing, no noise no test fire. more it just a little Bang the laser fired. So I just got home from work and going to re-solder the joint and be back in business, Thank god. Then I can work on tube.


IMG_2827.jpg IMG_2824.jpg

Make your life easy and solder some headers on there. Put female on the main board and 90 degree male on the daughter board. They look like .1" pitch which is very common. Measure between the pins to determine pitch.

[John Blazy]

This is why I bought my cheap Chinese laser from an ACTUAL IMPORTER with tech support.

[Robert White]

well guys I played with laser for over 3 hours and no more issues for the moment (crossing fingers) so that being said all that for a Bad solder - go figure