They're Heeeerrrreee!

[Joe Jones]

I know ... I haven't even OPENED the F2 CO2 laser yet, and now ... another laser arrived at my doorstep. I guess if I die tonight, my Executor will have his hands full, trying to unload all of these machines and tools.

Joe

F1.jpg

[martyy]

I am laser dumb, what can one do with these?

[rdj357]

I am laser dumb, what can one do with these?

Stack them and use them for dinette chairs and table currently.

[martyy]

I am laser dumb, what can one do with these?

Stack them and use them for dinette chairs and table currently.

Good call! How did you know my dinner table is full of crap? Can you hear me too?

I am kind of curious about lasers. I am thinking it would be great to mark or personalize some of the stuff I cut on the plasma table.

[acourtjester]

Be sure the laser you are looking at will cut or engrave the material you use. There are C02, diode, and fiber lasers, they each can do different things.
Diode are the cheapest for low power ones but they are getting more powerful and expensive, but not as strong as a C02. C02 require cooling systems.
Do research to see what you may like. You can cut, etch, engrave, using different methods. Check out YouTube for a good look see, you may find something you like.

[Joe Jones]

To mark metal you need a FIBER laser. It is a different type of laser. The blue diode lasers cannot mark steel or metal.

I now have six, or maybe seven lasers. I honestly have lost count. I have to go out to the shop to check. This latest laser is a dual band laser. It is a blue diode laser that can quickly etch things like pens, and thumb drives, and smaller things. It also has an IR laser that can etch metal objects. With the rotary tool, you can etch onto the circumference of a wedding ring, for example. I bought the flat track for this laser, so I can place larger items, or multiple items beneath it and etch or cut them as the slide tray moves from one end to the other.

This F1 laser has many advantages over other lasers:

It is portable

It is a dual band laser

It is much faster than traditional blue diode lasers, burning images at up to 4,000mm per minute as opposed to around 400 mm/minute for traditional lasers.

Joe

[Joe Jones]

I am laser dumb, what can one do with these?

Stack them and use them for dinette chairs and table currently.

Not THAT right there is just FUNNY!!!

Joe

[Joe Jones]

I unpacked my nightstan ... er ... my F1 LASER today!

Joe

F1 WITH SLIDE TRAY.jpg

[Joe Jones]

Add the indoor air filter, of course.

Joe

F1 LASER AND AIR FILTER.jpg

[Joe Jones]

I am already thinking of accessories for this bad boy, to make it even more awesome. I sent a suggestion to X-Tool. I will see if they act on it before I attempt to make it myself.

Joe

[Joe Jones]

I am laser dumb, what can one do with these?

WARNING!

Falling down the rabbit hole of home hobby lasers is highly addictive. You will begin to lose sleep, and soon you will not be able to keep track of the time, or the days. Then your finances will dwindle, as you wait near your laptop for the Amazon truck, or the FedEx truck, or the UPS truck to arrive with yet another fix! It is all a huge LIE! No laser will EVER be powerful enough, so you will quickly find yourself searching aimlessly for ever increasing power at any cost. You will begin to seriously consider selling your car, your dog, and even your wife, just so you can move up to a more powerful narrow beam of concentrated light. As your designs become more intricate and greater in size, you will start to wonder if you really can burn a design across your redwood deck.

You will begin to experiment with all kinds of things ... wood, plastics, foams, metals, and more. Nothing will escape your lust to experiment with a laser. Soon, you will be removing the wall switch plates, just so you can etch them with ON and OFF, and again with UP and DOWN, and finally LIGHT and DARK. and the toilet lid is a prime target. You will etch your cell phone case, and your camera case, and your house keys ... and as the paranoia grows roots, there will be nothing in your entire home that does not need to be laser etched in case of theft.

There is no cure. There is no treatment. Once you are infected with the laser bug, THERE IS NO TURNING BACK. It is too late for me. I am a slave to the future of lasers now. Save yourselves!

Joe

[Joe Jones]

I assembled the rotary attachment tonight. It is for the mugs, and eggs, and baseballs, and Christmas ornaments, and hand grenades ...

Joe

P1 ROTARY ATTACHMENT.jpg

[Joe Jones]

I haven't even turned this one on yet, but I have decided that it can do more than it was originally designed to do. So I just ordered six sets of 59" glide rails from VEVOR, to try an experiment. My thought is, if this laser can burn images directly onto the surface of whatever it is resting upon, why not set up a long track with some sort of graduated indexing system, and run the laser along a track to create a long design?

My home has solid maple flooring all around, except for in the kitchen and bathrooms. I am thinking that I can create a repetitive design that has terminal ends both left and right, and 90 degree turn segments in both directions on each side, similar to the chain templates I created earlier. Imagine laying a track on the floor along the baseboards, and using the laser to etch a custom design into the wood floor that follows the contours of each rom.

This track could also be laid across a solid wood door, to create designs around the perimeters. I see a lot of potential in this F1 laser, and this week, I will make sure to connect my laptop to the device and begin the experiments!

Joe

[Joe Jones]

My first attempt to figure this thing out!

Joe

http://youtu.be/wbm2zKwnRYY?feature=shared

[plasmanewbie]

Super cool Joe! Neet looking little machine, curious to see what you are able to do with it.

[Joe Jones]

The sliding table is an accessory for the laser. It can be removed, and the laser can burn material on its base. Or the base can be removed, and it can burn straight through onto the surface that it is resting on. So me being the experimental type, I bought several 60 inch glide rails from VEVOR. My thought is that I could create a track that I could mount the laser onto and then run the laser along the perimeters of the walls in my house for example, to burn a design into the wood floor itself all around the perimeters of the rooms. The tracks can also be laid onto a solid wood entry door to create a design around the perimeter, or across the midsection, or wherever. The LASER itself is pretty awesome, and I am just beginning to experiment with its capabilities.

Joe

[Joe Jones]

I am laser dumb, what can one do with these?

Stack them and use them for dinette chairs and table currently.

The struggle is real.

Joe

MY SHOP STORAGE.jpg

[acourtjester]

Come on Joe you just want to burn arrows to show the way to the kitchen.

[rdj357]

Come on Joe you just want to burn arrows to show the way to the kitchen.

[Joe Jones]

Come on Joe you just want to burn arrows to show the way to the kitchen.

The kitchen, the recliner, the bathroom, the bedroom ... the bathroom attached to the bedroom ...

Joe

[Joe Jones]

Come on Joe you just want to burn arrows to show the way to the kitchen.

Hey! There's an idea! I do have solid walnut wood floors in this house. I have been thinking of trying something daring, like a 'YUGE compass rose on the floor at the front entrance.

Joe

[Joe Jones]

The F1 ULTRA lasers are on their way. They will arrive in a few days. Unfortunately... ... there is a road trip to San Antonio, Texas in the works over the 4th of July weekend, and I am also hunting down more DHC2 tables for the grate elevator conversion project, whenever that eventually happens.

I sure could use a visit from John Derby for a few days. He would help me knock down these obstacles!

My #1 robot, the LUBA 2 AWD 10000 is on its way back from CommieFornia after a warranty repair. Oddly, I assigned the entire property to robot #2, and it has been handling it, no problemo. It makes me wonder why I purchased TWO of them. Well, they will duplicate their work, each now programmed to mow the entire property in five areas, and PERHAPS at the same time.

Guys are coming in a few days to put a new roof onto the mower shed. I have another three tons of black lava rock to distribute around the property too. Then I will be back to finally set up the lasers on the second floor of the FrankenBarn. It is a bigger project now, with a full ventilation network needed, hanging from the ceiling and with blast gates, etc.

Still no helper.

Joe

[Joe Jones]

Again, I am racing a clock... I have to do two small jobs I took on for friends first. One is to route out six sign blanks from a 4x8 sheet of white plex. The second, is to route a pattern into new cabinet doors that MATCHES the existing doors. That one is a bit more difficult. I will have to get creative with router bits to match the contours.

The F1 ULTRA lasers are here, and waiting for me to unpack them. GET INTO LINE, GUYS! On July 5th, I have to run to Texas to train some guys on DesignEdge software, and then swing over to pick up another DHC2 table I picked up at an auction. Meanwhile, I have opened my home to a friend who is currently unemployed. He will be doing work for me around my property, until he either gets his old job back (he worked at the Corvette plant, but fell through the cracks when a doctor failed to file paperwork for a medical leave of absence) or he finds another job, which will not likely pay what GM was paying him to build Corvettes. Hopefully the UNION will step up and get his job back for him. I. HATE. UNIONS!

Another friend from Illinois is coming back down too, for a while. Her situation is dire, and I am doing what I can to help. She may stay for a month or so, or maybe a lot longer. She is not a bad roommate. I have HAD bad roommates.

Meanwhile, I have spent today playing with my Laserpecker 2 machine, and moving terabytes of DATA from an old hard drive to a new USB hard drive after my main PC gave up the ghost. It is amazing, how many things you can find to TAG with a laser like this ... "Property of Joe Jones ...270-###-#### Reward for Return ..." It is more of a learning experience, using the same laser to burn a simple tag onto various materials. Some of them take it like a champ, while others ... the 450nm blue diode laser cannot even TOUCH them. Still, many of the things I might otherwise leave at a training session or in a hotel room are now tagged for (hopeful) return via mail.

On top of all this, is my desire to buy a new PlasmaCam GENESIS table with all of the bells and whistles. However, I have to say that ... these lasers are addictive! Once you start using them, you don't want to stop! I have not moved this laser to my shop though, so my whole house smells like someone set fire to Stretch Armstrong Thank God for FeBreeze!

Joe


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[acourtjester]

Joe you can etch stainless steel with a blue laser, you coat it with mustard and laser away.

DSCN5107.JPG

[plasmanewbie]

Joe you can etch stainless steel with a blue laser, you coat it with mustard and laser away.

Coat it with mustard and laser etch! You've got to be kidding me! How powerful of a laser do you need to do this? Great...now i'm hungry...