Sight Unseen

[Wesley Perreira]

Need some advice...

Starting a new business and buying a new laser engraver in the next few days. I live in the middle of the Pacific on an island and have no chance of visiting a dealer that sells laser engravers. I can only visit the dealer sites, speak to the sales reps on the phones, and then make my decision based on my research to purchase a $30,000 piece of equipment "sight unseen." You can probably sense how nervous I am about this endeavour.

I'm leaning towards an Epilog EXT 60W or Laserpro Spirit GX 60W because of the door feature. I was planning on doing headstones and some other larger items unique to my area. My core business will be awards, engraving, gifts, and some construction projects.

Wondering if anyone has some experience with these specific models and/or the company's support system. Both reps plug their product/company as the best and to learn the truth, you have to ask the people who've been there. Anyone?

Aloha,

Wes

[Scott Shepherd]

No advice on the lasers, but I'd suggest you have a look at maximum table weight for them if you are thinking of headstones. I don't think it was the EXT, but someone recently posted some weight limits on the model down, I think, and it was in the 20-40lb area. So if you're planning on a headstone, you might have problem.

[Darren Null]

No advice on either of the machines, except to type both into the SMC search and see what stories pop up.

I would check the load-bearing abilities of the tables of each, though, if you're planning on doing headstones. They are very heavy things and may well exceed (by quite a lot) the weight the tables can carry. I did a 60x40x3cm slab of marble -nothing like headstone size- and my table was very unhappy with me.

EDIT: You're too fast for me, Scott.
Thinking about the headstone thing, it would be possible, using builder's trestles either side of the machine. You'd have to focus manually though. Also, lasering doesn't go very deep and would probably weather quite quickly. Sandblasting would be a better way of doing things. Or just laser yourself some guidelines and dremil the letters out. NOTE: wear breathing apparatus if you're going to go the dremil route. Silicosis is no joke.

[Doug Griffith]

On my Epilog it seems possible to drop the table all the way to the bottom, remove the vector grid, and use riser blocks to hold some fairly heavy items. You'd have to shim the items to focus because I'm sure the z-axis motor has low load ratings.

Just a thought.

[Joe Pelonio]

With a purchase that large, it seems worth the cost to make a trip to the mainland to see the machines in action. Still, if that is not an option, many others have bought the same way, sight unseen.

As mentioned by Darren you can read many of their stories here on past posts.

Personally I have had nothing but good experience with Epilog which is set up to be able to handle your situation. Repairs are done by the owner with parts shipped to you, and support via e-mail and telephone. I imagine there would be some delays in getting things to you compared to the rest of us by we normally get parts the day after we order them. You might also have some time zone issues for support, since they have set business hours, but that is probably true for all of the laser companies.

[Gary Hair]

I agree with Joe, for a 30k purchase I would be more than willing to spend the money for a round trip demo excursion. Nothing against any of the opinions here, but they are exactly that, opinions. You really need to get first hand knowledge of the equipment you are considering, especially for 30k

Gary

[Marc Myer]

Wes,
I too live on an island in the Pacific and own an Epilog.
While mine is a Mini, I'd be glad to show it to you, and let you test some materials/files. This way you can at least get more familiar with the machine and I can share my experience with it.

Randy Allen and Roy Brewer (Epilog reps) make regular trips here and will be glad to help you. Their number is (817)460-8122.
marc

[Bill Cunningham]

Also, lasering doesn't go very deep and would probably weather quite quickly. Sandblasting would be a better way of doing things. Or just laser yourself some guidelines and dremil the letters out.

Not really Darren; I agree that it does not go very deep, but if you walk through any graveyard and look at polished granite headstones, don't look at the engraving, look at the polished surface. How many do you see where the polished surface has worn down to the point where it's raw granite? Not many I'll bet.. Same with polished granite floors.. Thousand of people walking across them everyday yet the surface is not worn off.. The same life expectancy can be expected from polished granite that has been lasered... At the very minimum, it will last longer than any one that would personally care.. The dates on the old graveyard stones would verify the useful life of the polished surface.. Sand carving is nice, but won't render a photo as well as a laser

[Darren Null]

I sit corrected, thank you. Being in the South of Spain, the worst problem is killer UV...we don't really get extremes of temperature (where I am) and frost cracking etc; so I was just guessing about the longlevity. It just struck me that lasering doesn't go very deep & weathering might have been a problem.

How well do lasered granite floors weather do you know?

[Rags Alan Ragland]

I totally agree with what has already been written. One option might be to use the laser to vector a mask for any size headstone you need, then sand blast through the mask for a nice depth. I use this method all the time and it works great. I also do this on river stones, and sea shells.
Just my two cents. That's all I have after my Epilog EXT36/75 watt.
Dr. Rags

[Mike Mackenzie]

Wes,

If you are in Hawaii then I would strongly recommend calling around to the different shops and seeing for yourself what systems they use. You will be surprised with the number of Universal Lasers that are currently in use on the Islands.

I speak from experience I just returned from there putting in yet three more systems. At our last count we are pushing 125 systems state wide. I really believe there is a reason for this.

Annual service calls, Free Installation & Training, proven reliable systems, etc.

If you would like to send me a PM I will be glad to send you references

[Richard Rumancik]

I'm leaning towards an Epilog EXT 60W or Laserpro Spirit GX 60W because of the door feature. I was planning on doing headstones and some other larger items unique to my area.

How thick will the headstones be? Laser engravers were not designed to accomodate headstones but there might be a way to do it on some models . . .

I don't have a Spirit but a Mercury. With this unit there is only about 6.5" or so for maximum workpiece thickness (the distance between the tip of the focus probe and the table.) But you should not attempt to put any significant weight on a laser table or you will bend the table and screws.

I noticed on the Mercury that the bottom lip of the front door cutout is quite a bit higher than the rear, so for this unit I'd be inclined to bring the material from the rear. (I think you would probably have to temporarily remove the table to do headstones, or you will not have enough vertical clearance. On the Mercury this would mean 6 screws.) I would design a wheeled cart with angle-iron "forks" and load the stone on the forks. Then "drive" the cart in from the back of the laser.

You need to be able to adjust height for focus (a jack or two on the cart?) plus be able to lock in your alignment to the axes (so you are square to the raster direction.) If the free end of the forks sags too much you may need an additional jack that captures the forks from the front and allows levelling. The cart would probably need a counterweight. Get the front wheels under the laser if possible.

With some thought and effort I think this could be viable and you could probably come up with a method to convert back and forth quickly. There would be some significant design work and some money in making a proper handling cart. Moving heavy headstones is dangerous and your equipment needs to be properly designed to avoid injury and/or damage to equipment.

Since the headstone could not protrude through the front on the Mercury, (unless thinner than say 5.5") you would be somewhat limited as to where you can put the graphic.

My concept applies to the Mercury only and may be applicable to other models, but without seeing them first-hand and making measurements it is difficult to speculate.

[Robert Rosensteel]

Check out Kern lasers..