[Retroplayer]

I miss the activity on this thread. I check every day. Rolf how are you doing? Anyone notice the number of views?

Sorry guys. I have been really really swamped with work. Haven't even had time to do anything more with my laser cutter. But I am keeping an eye on the thread and am ready to support whenever you guys are ready to install. And yeah, what happened to Rolf?

[hububalli]

Hello everyone,

This thread is exactly what I was looking for! I am pretty handy when messing with hardware but when it comes to the controllers and firmware I get lost. From reading all this it seems like this is exactly what I am after, but before I start ordering all the bits I wanted to check what the raster performance is like. So with my stock k40 I just have the laser firing at whatever power I have set the knob to on the panel. With this setup is the laser power controlled from the controller instead? In which case can I have varying power levels in one job allowing me to do some proper laser engraving? Possibly even venture into the 3rd dimension with grey scale heightmaps?

I got the laser about a month ago and have lots of mods planned. I hope to document them all to help others out like you have been doing here. I am really happy with my cheapy laser and with a few mods I think it could be pretty awesome.

[buddydog]

Mine works OK with LaserDRW and I have not installed the arduino yet. I'm waiting on Retro! The arduino is fun to play with all by itself. I think the 40w cheapies are good little machines. The users often don't know what they are getting into. One of the main reasons I got interested in the arduino is that it is aboard that could be used with any machine so if upgrading in size, power etc. you at least won't have to relearn the digital part.

Control of the laser power from the controller appears to be power supply driven so I'm not sure if all machines will support it.

[hububalli]

I have been getting on ok with Moshidraw 2014, once you figure out how to use the software and not upset the laser! 2014 seems to be quite a step forward compared to some of the older versions I have seen. I agree that it seems people expect a bit too much from a machine that costs so little. For me that is ideal, who wants to buy something that works straight out of the box? Getting a new toy and spending a day sorting it out before even turning it on is part of it for me.

Arduino is a great platform, they are good fun to mess about with I agree, and the user support is a big part of that. The availability of so much code that others create and share makes it perfect for me.

From my research it seems that most recent k40 ebay lasers have a power supply that supports PWM. My machine is the type with a single, central power supply and a single control board, so I am pretty certain that I can utilise PWM. I know that the LaOS controller supports this but it is a much more expensive solution. Arduino is a better platform for me, and in the long run is more useful to get to know properly.

[hububalli]

I made this for myself as there are no markings on my power supply at all. I thought that It would be good to share now I have done it. If there are any errors on it please feel free to point them out!

K40 40w Laser power supply pin out

[buddydog]

Well it's been almost a month since the last post on this thread and I miss all my buddy's and the saga that is "modifications" so I am bumping this thread again to see if there has been any activity.

[vinylcutters]

Hi

I am in the process of buying a chinese laser
but I am very worried about the contollers / mainboards
there are so many options
Moshidraw
Newly Draw
LIHUIYU
TAIZHI
winsealXP15E

Which one should I consider ?

I am also looking at bigger lasers
they come with 2 makes of controllers
Raidu / Rd works
DSP / Lasercut

Which is better

Thanks
Ebrahim

[buddydog]

Hi Ebrahim. It kind of depends on what you want and hopefully others will answer. I can speak for LaserDRW which is supplied with some of the 40w cheap 500-800 dollar lasers on ebay. I have that program/board and though "fiddly" it is stable and does both vector and engraving. It will even chose a vector path on a bitmap (.bmp) if you select "cutting" in the engrave menu. Not that it chooses an efficient path but it will do it. Designing within it is the "fiddly" part and pretty limited to basic shapes. I do it anyway but it takes some time, not for commercial use at all. Most convert to AWC608 from light object company. Apparently it does everything well. If I buy a bigger unit I will try to spec it with no controller and software and use the AWC608 and always keep that on any machine I buy so as not to have to keep re-learning a new program every time I upgrade! This thread is experimenting with the arduino open source platform but were all kind of waiting on the resident engineer, Retroplayer to finish his so we can copy him with our cheap 40w units. He is busy with work right now so not much action. This is for those of us who have working units but want to explore an open source experiment.

[hububalli]

Hello again,

So I have all the bits and bobs needed to convert my laser over to the Arduino/Ramps and will start working on that soon. I just finished building a Reprap so have been playing with that

Its going to take me a while as I don't have that much time to spare at the moment but I will make a start.

[buddydog]

My son just picked up my brothers shapeoko he never got finished and my son and I got it working in a couple of nights. It's another arduino machine so I'm surrounded by these things. Pleas be sure and post updates and pictures as you go. This thread of Rolfs really has some followers!

[Rolf_K]

My son just picked up my brothers shapeoko he never got finished and my son and I got it working in a couple of nights. It's another arduino machine so I'm surrounded by these things. Pleas be sure and post updates and pictures as you go. This thread of Rolfs really has some followers!

There is a lot going on over at the Google Open Source Laser forum that I have been following closely. Their version of the $32 laser controller is an Arduino Mega and an RAMPS 1.4 board with an Extension to Inkscape for raster engraving.
Hopefully I will get the rest of my hardware shortly so that I can try it out.
Here is a link showing it in action:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DKSxDIkqoA

[buddydog]

Resurrecting this thread once more. Retro where are you?? Hope your well!
So got the arduino out again and tried loading some different sketches and managed to ruin all the previous work discussed on hereby downloading "other" sketches. So I went back and read all the posts and reconfigured the board back to the laser program and the lcd is working just the way it did before. The main reason I got this out again was to see if I could run a stepper motor. I use the LCD to select "stepper enabled" and a red light comes on steady on the ramps. I try to move the stepper via the "prepare" menu selecting the "X" motor which is where my stepper is. By adjusting the pot on the 8825 I get a buzzing on the motor shaft at about 30% on the pot but no movement of the motor. ALSO after a minute or two the board resets (screen goes blank for a second and returns to opening page "laser ready" or such and I have to enable the stepper again and when I do the red light comes on again. I should say while the stepper is enabled it is locked so I know it's getting signal. If I leave "steppers disabled" the board does not reset. Is the steady red light normal or sign of a problem with the ramps? Also it does the same thing even if I remove the one driver I have installed and pull the motor connector.

[buddydog]

I kept at it and I think I answered my own questions. It works when hooked to the E0 or extruder bay. End stops are needed for X, Y, and Z so that is probably the reason you can't just hook a motor to those and have it run. Not sure about the red light or the spontaneous reset but probably related to missing end stops and thermistors or the prepare screen times out? No problems for now! Still would like to hear from the rest of you "experimenters".

There is more to this than I have been telling. This crosses over to another thread I have started. I have a Charter Oak 12Z. I think it's the biggest bench milling machine you can get. Next size up-Bridgeport! (OK maybe a slight exaggeration) making it's way across the country to a terminal about 50 miles away and all 900 lbs of it should be here Wednesday. It to is destined for an arduino I think!

[buddydog]

Hello Retro, Rolf. Where are you?? I have been doing a lot of playing with this project over the last two weeks. I do not have it hooked into the laser yet choosing instead to learn as much about the whole arduino thing as possible before committing this board to the machine. I have several other plans for the arduino before I stop playing with it. I have a nema 34 stepper/driver/power supply showing up tomorrow and I plan on mounting it to the big milling machine first as an arduino controlled X axis power feed and then a ball screw conversion on my way to a three axis cnc conversion. I have learned there is more than one "arduino". The mega I have is different from the uno. I did not know that before. For cnc the uno with grbl firmware is considered better but I have not found uno with the LCD readout and the camera card operation like my mega with the ramps shield. Marlin (3d printer stuff) uses different pinouts than grbl and the two don't play well together on the wrong machines!

I am having one problem I can't seem to solve and I would appreciate some thoughts/advice on it. When I finally hooked a stepper to the ramps board, I was never able able to get the x or y axis to move? Z and extruder (E0) moves the stepper but not x or y. The enable pin is functioning as the motor "locks" just fine but no movement. Also I get a red light on the ramps and after a few seconds the board resets on it's own? I thought maybe it was waiting for heating function or end stops but I have not been able to get it moving jumper-ing endstops to ground? I am thinking it's a problem in "configuration.h" but I want more information before I start hacking that program. Another "confession" I should make is I have the DRV8825 drivers on the ramps board and I installed them backwards to start (the other driver type installs opposite) with but that was in x,y,z and I know the drivers are fine by substituting in z and they all work fine. Maybe I blew the mega but my electronics "gut" says no. What I would like is to be able to send the z signals to the x or y pins on the arduino for troubleshooting purposes. There is a sketch/library/program (not sure what it is but it's called out in marlin tab as an "include.pins" function) and I cannot find ".pins" anywhere I have looked (library's etc). I think that is where I could change the pin numbers? Anyone? Thanks

[jmoreno]

I made this for myself as there are no markings on my power supply at all. I thought that It would be good to share now I have done it. If there are any errors on it please feel free to point them out!

K40 40w Laser power supply pin out

Were you conect the ballast resistor? Cathode - or anode +....

[Crashoverride]

Were you conect the ballast resistor? Cathode - or anode +....

this version doesn't have ballast resistor

[Retroplayer]

Hello Retro, Rolf. Where are you??

Retro checking in. Sorry it has been a while. As I mentioned to you in a personal message before, I had some major things coming up in May. Most of my resources were tied up in that, but I just returned from overseas and hopefully can dedicate some time to this again (though the pocketbook resources are low at the moment.)

Anyway, I am here and haven't completely abandoned this project.

[buddydog]

Retro checking in. Sorry it has been a while. As I mentioned to you in a personal message before, I had some major things coming up in May. Most of my resources were tied up in that, but I just returned from overseas and hopefully can dedicate some time to this again (though the pocketbook resources are low at the moment.)

Anyway, I am here and haven't completely abandoned this project.

Good to hear from you! I was wondering if we should send out the cavalry. You really started something. I now own 3 or 4 Arduinos, CNC V3 grbl breakout board, breadboard jumpers etc and I bought a new Charter Oak 12Z (biggest bench milling machine you can buy) to CNC. I'm gonna sell my old RF30 round column machine. Ordered a nema 34 1600 oz stepper with driver and 70 volt power supply and driver assembly, learned that the 8825 smaller drivers CAN be plugged in backwards and still survive, know my way around a sketch to drive a big or small driver for nema 17 or 34 stepper motors, Whew! Not much on the laser front. Looking forward to more stimulating conversation!!

[Retroplayer]

Good to hear from you! I was wondering if we should send out the cavalry. You really started something. I now own 3 or 4 Arduinos, CNC V3 grbl breakout board, breadboard jumpers etc and I bought a new Charter Oak 12Z (biggest bench milling machine you can buy) to CNC. I'm gonna sell my old RF30 round column machine. Ordered a nema 34 1600 oz stepper with driver and 70 volt power supply and driver assembly, learned that the 8825 smaller drivers CAN be plugged in backwards and still survive, know my way around a sketch to drive a big or small driver for nema 17 or 34 stepper motors, Whew! Not much on the laser front. Looking forward to more stimulating conversation!!

Wow. You really took off with this! I have so many ideas and so little time, I swear. Well, and resources at the moment, but that will change soon.

My life story:

Have time? You don't have money.
Have money? You don't have time.
Have money AND time? Wake up, you are probably dreaming!

[buddydog]

I just feel like I'm running out of time. I've added looking at another big boat to the mix... jeesh, don't know what I'm thinking. I've been retired for years and don't know how I ever had time to work.