Eric Gunnerson made this DIY pogo-pin test jig: I decided to build a pogo-pin test jig, and since the approach I came up with was different than the other approaches I’ve seen I thought it would be worth sharing. I’m going to be targeting my laser cutter for fabrication, though I could have chosen to […]
Tag Archives: Laser cutter
New 2.5D pen/laser ESP32 controller
Bdring published a new build: I have done several pen and laser machines lately, so I decided to create a custom PCB for Grbl_ESP32 for these types of machines. This is a small (70mm x 60mm) PCB with all the features a pen plotter or laser cutter/engraver would need. These typically use stepper motors for […]
Getting control over a 50 watt CO2 laser cutter from China
Unboxing laser cutter Co2 50 watt from China: There are people around me who think I’m crazy. And they are probably right. Who else would buy a machine from someone he does not know. I have to pay upfront. It is not clear how things will get delivered, what gets delivered, or if it gets delivered […]
Continuous Autofocus laser cutter hack
Continuous Autofocus of a laser cutter using a wiimote controller from Martin Raynsford, he writes: We were inspired by the Glowforge laser cutters ability to continuously autofocus it’s z axis. A camera mounted in the head of the laser detects a laser dot being shone onto the surface of the material and from there it can […]
40 Watt Chinese CO2 laser upgrade with RAMPS & Arudino
Dan Beaven has written up documentation on his Chinese K40 Laser upgrade: I’ve wanted to start playing with Laser Cutter/Engravers for quite a while. I finally happened across a great deal on a Chinese made 40 watt Laser Engraver with the Moshidraw software and control hardware. Wanting something I can modify and that is of better […]
40W handheld laser cutter
Martin Raynsford has written an article detailing his 40W handheld laser cutter: To generate the high voltage required to start lasing within the tube, I connected 200x 9V ‘dead’ batteries together, this generates nearly 2000V across the laser tube. I’ve been collecting these batteries for months, you can use old batteries for this because they only […]
Open source laser cutter
Martin Raynsford has written an article detailing his open source laser cutter project: Now that I have an easy way to switch controllers into my laser it’s time to try out some of the different softwares. I’m quite comfortable with Arduino and I’ve got a fair few of them kicking round my house so that’s […]
Cheap laser cutter arrives pretty busted up
Like many others we have succumbed to the urge for a cheap laser cutter. What started as a $200 purchase quickly doubled, but that’s still a fraction of the cost of an expensive one. Why do we what it? That’s a not very well hit secret. The ubiquitous blue Chinese freight truck drops the crate […]
DIY laser cutter project
Hans Peter of Embryonic.dk has been working on a Laser cutter project and wrote a detailed explanation on his blog describing the build: Having seen the crazy-fast development of the printers during the time I’ve had mine, I can clearly see that my printer is not the fastest or the most precise in the league anymore. Most of […]
PCBs made using a laser cutter
Joebell wrote this Instructable detailing the process of making a double-sided PCBs with a laser cutter: With a little practice, you can make excellent double-sided PCBs by combining a laser cutter with chemical etching. The basic idea is: the laser cutter blasts away spray painted etch resist, then chemicals eat away the exposed copper. Once the copper […]
Arduino based ‘Etch A Sketch’ laser cutter
Martin Raynsford writes about his latest Arduino based project: We switched out the standard controller with an Arduino (just in time for Arduino day) and connected two rotary dials to directly manipulate the X and Y axis. As long as the laser only cuts while the axis are moving then we should avoid fires. We’ll […]
Arduino based Z Axis laser cutter controller
An Arduino based Z Axis laser cutter controller by Martin Raynsford The user pad has 4 buttons, one fast and one slow in either direction. If you push fast and slow at the same time the Z axis will datum in that direction, because the Z axis control system is now independent of the laser controller […]
Double sided PCB etching using a laser cutter
This video by Rich Olson demonstrates his method for creating 2-layer PCBs using his laser cutter and chemical etching. Via Hacked Gadgets.
LaserOrigami: Laser-cutting 3D objects
Researchers at Germany’s Hasso Plattner Institute have developed an amazing new Laser cutting 3D objects, the LaserOrigami: LaserOrigami is a rapid prototyping system that produces 3D objects using a laser cutter. LaserOrigami is substantially faster than traditional 3D fabrication techniques such as 3D printing and unlike traditional laser cutting the resulting 3D objects require no […]
DIY laser cutter for PCB stencils
HardwareBreakout shared a tutorial on how to make your own laser cutter for cutting PCB stencils: Are you sick and tired of using a tooth pick to apply solder paste? Are you still using through hole components because you don’t want to deal with soldering surface mount devices (SMD)? If so, this post provides you […]