If you were to walk into most of the world’s hackerspaces, it’s likely that the most frequent big-ticket tool you’ll find after a 3D printer is a laser cutter. A few years ago that would inevitably been one of the ubiquitous blue Chinese-made K40 machines, but here in 2024 it’s become common to see something far more sophisticated. For all that, many of us are still laser cutter noobs, and for us [Dominic Morrow] gave a talk at last summer’s EMF Camp in the UK entitled “Getting Started In Laser Cutting“. [Dominic] is a long-term laser cutting specialist who now works for Lightburn, so he’s ideally placed to deliver this subject.
It’s fair to say that this is an overview in the time available for a hacker camp talk rather than an in-depth piece, so he takes the approach of addressing people’s misconceptions and concerns about cutters. Perhaps the most important one he addresses is the exhaust, something we’ve seen a few in our community neglect in favor of excessive attention to laser cooling or other factors. An interesting one for us though was his talking about the cheaper diode lasers, having some insight into this end of the market is valuable when you have no idea which way to go.
We’re sorry to have missed this one in the real world, perhaps because of the allure of junk.
I want a laser cutter which can do copper clad boards
“And I just want a million dollars” – Chandler Bing
And a looooong jacket.
tuuuun tudududun tudu dudu duuuuu dun
“Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.” – Albert Einstein
My little K40 does that indirectly. Just cover the copper with matt black spray, use the laser to remove the paint where you want the copper to be etched and stick the board in the acid.
What resolution do you get with that method?
Marco Reps made a video about using UV sensitive PCB and an UV laser and he got quite good results with that.
I powder coated a PCB with laser toner using a little powder coat gun, then do “laser printing” to melt my traces, then etch.
I’ve wondered a time or two if toner powder was compatible with the “powder coating” process. Good to know. Not sure why I want to know, but good to know.
that’s actually doable with the new fiber lasers that are pricey but not car-level pricey (around 1300$ you get a commaker b3).
Check youtube videos that do exactly that with commaker b3 and b6, it’s incredible!
When I mentioned this to someone with a lot of laser experience he mentioned that he tried it and it was really hard. The amount of power you need to get rid of the copper will vaporize the FR4 in a split second. So you need some smart system to detect the copper is gone that responds really fast, or some really clever optics that focus only on the copper layer and defusing quickly below that.
Or be able to tolerate slight ditches between your traces?
Coated with conductive carbon?
The laser would be pretty expensive. Unless “laser” is just a name you gave your endmill.
I’d love to have a cheap laser cutter that can engrave steel (both stainless and carbon steel). Etching neat looking logo’s and text into it. Anyone got experience with that with these cheap laser cutters? A main concern of mine is that if it can engrave it, it might engrave it in the wrong spot. Especially what I’m planning to do, I don’t want it to be a mm off.
That capability isn’t cheap, really. You would need a fiber laser, so that’s 1k+, if you want deep engravings instead of surface you need even more power and that is a lot more expensive.
You can etch steel using a battery a salt water solution and a cotton ball.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Yyvn00JoRZE
I’m fully aware of the method. That’s what I’m using now. But thank you. I’d love to use a laser instead.
The sharks won’t give theirs up easily!
Not engraving, per se, but you can use molybdenum lubricant spray (or much more expensive purpose-made chemicals) and a hobby laser to make marks on metal.