I've been cutting 18-20mm MDF with our big laser. It's yucky stuff, but the customer specified it.
The little aquariam pump air-assist really only keeps smoke away from the lenses, and has no fire extinguishing capabilities.
So I rigged up a separate air compressor and line coming down from the ceiling to the laser head - and rigged copper pipe through the now-defunct pen position/autofocus holder.
It served its purpose, and I got nice straight cuts and no under-burning, but of course, despite a water trap, there's still condensation in that line blowing as close as i could point it to the beam entry spot. That job took about 23 hours of laser time - 2 MDF sheets nested up tightly cut at 3 mm/sec- the job took a little over 3 days.
Really, I think I had too much air blowing, and want to rejig it with a finer copper pipe, and reduced air volume- but maintain pressure.
My question is instead of mounting it just beside the nozzle like I did, would it be ok to plumb it through the normal air nozzle insert, and out the nozzle?
I'm thinking the hole will be too big to get a nice pressurised jet of air- or am I wrong?
Thanks for any thoughts!