Category: Site News

but an update is due i have been playing with the map a bit more have offset the roads to make the bolder on the map have also removed some names and features.

more updates to follow soon.

Monday

Well was a working week in the man cave dident post as gifts for the wife so dident want any spoiler alerts for her.

Monday i remixed the lightburn camera mount as i only had some small screws to fit the mount so resized the hols to 1.2mm and made some cutouts in the base to allow it to fit in the middle of my handle nuts I might change this in the future to have holes through the base but wanted this to be quick and easy so I could calibrate the camera and getting all up and running nice and quickly.

I then calibrated the camera in lightburn. this took some understanding but that was down to me not looking at the calibration video on you tube correctly. It worked very well on my second attempt. i then aligned the camera using the alignment patten. once this was done the camera was set up for camera control.

So what is camera control? it’s using the camera to aligned materials for engraving its also used for tracing designs. for example, I wanted a design to be close to the edge of material I am using as didn’t want to waste any. so I updated image this places the image on the background of my work area in lightburn.

Tuesday

Tonight’s little project was for a game of airsoft I was attending at the weekend. I need to patch for a jacket in hind site I should have just done it straight to the jacket as my sewing skills are not as good.

so i decided to experiment with denim had seen a video online of some one using a fiber laser to age and cut out denim jeans. so this gave me the idea for doing the same to some old jeans i had. i cut a test sample. ran my calibration matrix for it. i dident picture it as was a lot of burn through from anything below 200 mm/s and over 40% power. i setteled on 400 mm/s and 20% power.

using my camera I positioned the cutout piece of jean leg on the table. I then focused the laser. I ran the frame option to double check the position of material and hit play. i had also placed a box around the design an put the power at 40% 20mm/s this cut the denim very cleanly.

think i will now do it directly on the jacket as my sewing skills ere not up to much as image beneath shows.

Wensday

today project were some more gifts for mothers day. so I had brought a load of slate hearts last year when pound land was doing them cheap. so I had a seen a design online so I decided to do something similar I changed the text a bit as the wife does not like mum or mother so mummy it was changed to that.

i then did another screen update to show material on the bed and aligned my design to it last week i ran a test matrix on slate pictured below now it was cheap Spanish slate were as the slate i was using was the more expensive welsh slate but gave me the speed and power.

I decided on 65% power with a speed of 400 mm/s as gave the cleanest pass worked a charm. see picture below the final item.

I then decided to run some fun glass coasters for my wife. so did mummy est 2017 coaster and a mummy gin only coaster. decided to used laser bond 100 on one coaster to see what it looked like I settled on the speed of 300mm/s and 55% power as I had run a test matrix as well on glass. I tend to do this on all the materials I own as means get them usually right first time then.

just adding another monitor in the cave and clearing up more as need to make some space so i can get every thing up and running.

going to have a few days off as need some rest and relaxation as got a lot  going on in the day job back next week with more fun stuff.

Got my light burn camera with a £21.45 import duty today have decided to go with a different camera mount so it currently printing on the cr-10.

do not like it a nice tight fit but will need alot of sanding to become ajustable so I think I am going to run with a different holder for the camera and cut in out of acrylic tonight.

Next up mA meter i have fitted the mA meter in the housing added the 2 nuts to hold it in the houseing.

Now for the wiring going to run 2 wires through the housing of the laser down to the electronics of the laser. I will then crimp the 2 wires and attach them to the mA meter the + sign side i will attach some red heat shrink to to represent live side.

this will attach to the wire i will remove from the psu going to use a terminal block for time being till i decide if i am going to cut a hole in my laser to permanently mount mA meter later on. the – side will go back to the psu.

Now to test doing a test sample on some laser bond 100 with stainless steel as 1 i need to figure out speeds and powers. As i love how the guides all say 100% power and i know that will shorten the life of the tube.

Tonight will I will do a glass sample tomorrow night will just run raw laser sample as will do laser bond 100 as well another night.

Tomorrow night i will be adding light burn camera and hopefully get around to calibration and alignment. will do some cable mangment on my newly installed amp meter.

After being ill for most of the day, I figured out that there is a blockage in my mk3 extruder but was feeling so rough I had to go back to bed. I am feeling a little more human and the wife and son have gone out so have swapped machines. As I need to take the CR-10 for a test drive so printing the mA meter enclosure for the machine and then a light burn camera mount.

Watching remotely(in the warmth) via octoprint camera only as still need to do a rebuild of octoprint. if all fits will either spray it or reprint in black but for time being.

5hrs later mA meter housing made going to run the wires thought the back of the enclosure and then down the gap in to the electronics enclosure.

now just finished printing a camera enclosure for the light burn camera that is apparently in the uk just waiting for a custom charge. looks like my pramiters are off by a little just manged to snap bits as i was taking it off the bed. oh well going to ajust accordinly and re print tommorow.

had to do some wiring management with USB from CNC and vinyl cutter so made a start on that and installed another USB hub and Bluetooth dongle so can get some tunes on in the cave my built-in monitor speakers sucks big time. added some Kickstarter linkable speakers which work wickedly.

think the new heat bed and the magnetic bed will be done when I feel a little more human, hope to get this done before I go down to Wales for a long weekend.

Well nearly everything been getting drips and drabs from china over the last week so.

Cr-10 is working was a corrupted octoprint cusing it to time out so will be rebuilding it. now its working I might as well do some more tinkering so I have ordered solid state relay and a 750 watt silicon heated bed and cork insulation bed. As fed up of the slow heat up time of such a great machine. and a creality magnetic bed so will be stripping down the machine. probably Sunday and upgrading it.

3D Printing a housing for 30 mA meter to add to the new laser as don’t want to risk frying the tube too quick. Well ifIi can get it to print as just tried to print it without much luck it looks like my bed need to be recalibrated on the prusa mk3 so will do that tommorow. hoping for a Sunday update on that.

CNC machine z tool probe working. need to play with soft limits to stop it crashing but getting my head around Mach 3 which is an epic program but has a lot to get your head around as not as simple as just running your 3d design through a cutter and printing it. but I will get there soon. As someone who loves to modifiy my machines. I am going to add some limit switches. as it doesn’t look that hard to do. Coming soon.

I have remixed a test card for engraving on materials on the 50-watt laser. So I will know speeds and power for my machine done ply and painted ply going to do slate, glass, laser bond 100 on stainless steel and acrylic maybe some laminated acrylic.

been doing some custom boxes for friends children so did some chalk painted box and cut some felt out.

Waiting on the lightburn official camera to get through custom/charges to be issued so I can start using the camera control will make life easier for positioning of work pices.

Right been a long week for me as my boys been ill and teething so not got as much sleep and done as I wanted oh i am also rebuilding my OBS studio ready for some live feeds.

After installing my new 50w last wensday its been a struggle to do stuff with it as little one has been testing at times the but super cute at others lol such is life.

i managed to fire it up Wednesday got a test dot by 11 after getting a lift from a mate in to the mancave basically set it up

Thursday did first popper test was upside down back to front. I asked on the lightburn forum and by morning had a solution that I tested after work this cured the issue as the new machine had a different origin to the old machine. started on first test project worked ok needed to adjust speeds as much faster machine than my k40 so been testing to get the right speeds.

ordered a compatible EPL webcam 3d printed a bracket last night. camera arrived today so this evening fitted it to my laser

have done first calibration of the lens i have since figured out with Windows 10 to configure settings so will run it again as was low rez instead of hd. so will cover this tomorrow. once i have it all set up still works in low rez but want to get it working right before showing it off. i will record whilst cutting so can stream some project in action and also will allow me to align images to material. will put somthing togetgher next day or so to show it in action

In answer too much, been cleaning on and off an hour or 2 here and there and starting to make a dent. this post has been going on for the last 2 weeks have been updating picutures as i get bits sorted.

2 rack shelving units to move resize and rewire. one housing my 2 x 3d printers. one housing my CNC router and Viynal cutter/plotter. 3rd work top for my laser cutter.

Both moved and have changed hight of shelving so bottom parts of the racking can be used for storage and top half for equipment.

Right after 2 weeks of 20 / 30 mins here and here it’s getting better just started on wiring last night both working 3d Printers are both wired up just got to add a raspberry pi to each on for printing capture and control.

On to the CNC and vinyl cutter and storage racking. Have moved the shelving up so I can house more storage as space is already tight in my little shed.

Right just got to wire up the CNC machine and run USB cables for CNC and Vinal cutter back to new workshop computer. It is starting to get to the stage where I can see the floor of the workshop just my desk to sort out and worktop to order for the laser desk. have put my k40 on it for the time being.

just a bit more to sort out. Then find a box to put my out of order prusa in till I am ready to do the Haribo upgrade in the near future.

Well, the count down has started I ordered my K50 Chinese eBay model in the green and black configuration should be arriving at the office on the 4th march just got to get I home.

Now to get ready my old workshop pc had started to fall to bits so time for an upgraded so reconditioned my old gaming server to be my new workshop powerhouse. started to commission it last night swapped it over from the old machine time. will post some more pictures of the work shop once its all fineshed.

Well the count down has started for my new 50 watt laser now i need to have a spring clean and move around the joys of small work shop.

So 3D printers, cameo 3 cutter and CNC machine are moving from one side of the cave to the other old laser cutters going to my smaller wales workshop.this will be done a few weeks before I place the order for the new machine.

I am going to also be purchasing an industrial chiller as then I don’t need buckets of water hanging around. so investing CW-3000 to see if worth it. this will be ordered in the near future so will be ready to install with the new laser.

I will also be ordering some laser safety glasses so I can protect my eyes as wife gets scared when I go on about the big scary laser and to be truth full would do some damage if eyes ever met beam.

Will post some images of the new layout soon and will be looking to get some streams up after everything is wired up and working.

working on a list of projects i want to show being done shorlty but short list for this year

• Haribo Conversion of my original Prusa i3 mk2s as since doing the multi-material conversion has not worked so going back to a single extruder have the metal work for the frame just need to do some PETG of parts and get some t-nuts smooth rods and other parts to get ready for the build.

• odifying my 50 Watt laser as will need some add-ons as its a Chinese laser. So fitting amp meter checking over all the wiring looking at pictures I will be replacing the 2 American plugs on the side for accessories and replacing them with industrial C-13 connectors as much more reliable connection and earth as well. i

• live streams will work on doing this depending on how well my videos go down as hate being in front of the camera but for you lot, I will do it.