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Scott Meeker
01-03-2015, 4:14 PM
Good Afternoon and Happy New Year,

I'm new to this forum and engraving in general, so please forgive any miss-steps in protocol. I have a LaserPro Spirit LS and the problem I'm having occurs when I'm engraving, for example, a name plate on flexibrass. The engraving looks fine, but there are two small, feint vertical lines that appear on both sides of the text. Let's say I'm engraving "My Dog Spot". Here's what it would look like:


| My Dog Spot |
| 2010 |

I've had this problem before and the tech mentioned something about the lines being "ramp lines", but I don't recall what the fix action was. I would just call the tech, but he's not very responsive.

Another problem I'm have is also with flexibrasss. Some of the text appears to be bold even though none of the text was formatted that way. It's most noticeable with numbers. Let's say I'm engraving "2010 - 2014". Here's what it would look like:


2010 - 2014

Has anyone else experienced these problems?

Thanks,
Scott

Richard Rumancik
01-03-2015, 6:04 PM
Welcome to the forum! The lines you are seeing are because the tickle setting is mis-adjusted. Often a laser can be stable for years and there is no need to adjust the tickle setting but sometimes it drifts out or the laser is moved and it needs to be reset.

The laser tube is biased in a way so it is just on the threshold of lasing. This is so that when it gets the "laser on" command it will react quickly. But if the threshold is set too high it will lase when it is not supposed to. I don't think it really has anything to do with the "ramp", but the vertical lines will be in the turn-around zone.

I don't know how to adjust tickle on a Spirit but if you search tickle & LaserPro on this forum you will probably find some info. Otherwise ask the rep how to adjust it. Old machines were adjusted with a two-pin shunt on the mainboard but yours might be in firmware.

I don't know why you are getting bold numbers. What dpi are you using?

When you raster a character it has to map the raster dots based on the dpi you are using. Let's say it is 200 dpi. The laser has to decide which pixels to plot and which not to plot to make up a legible character. On the edges, if you have a half-pixel, the laser needs to decide whether to call it a full pixel (and plot it) or treat it as a non-pixel (and ignore it). So maybe what has happened is that on both sides of the character it has decided to round-off to a full pixel, making it look bold. On a small character the eye can detect the difference. This is just a guess . . . but if this is what is happening, then a higher resolution (eg 250 dpi, 300 dpi) might be enough to solve it. If you want to use a lower resolution, another possibility is to convert the text to bitmap rather than let the laser do it on the fly. Then you can preview what you will get. (You should always plot at the same resolution as the bitmap, however.)

Richard Rumancik
01-03-2015, 6:17 PM
Scott - further to the problem - I found some (poorly written) information in the LaserPro manual I found here on page 59. I am assuming you have a Synrad tube.

http://www.jorlink.com/Portals/0/Files/Brochures/Manual_Spirit_SI_GE_GX_LS_Maintenance_Manual_JorVe r.pdf

GCC sometimes calls the problem "laser bleeding". I don't know if this will be enough info for you to change the setting - you want to reduce the threshold. Try going into the firmware and see if you can find the menu setting they are referring to.

Scott Meeker
01-03-2015, 7:49 PM
Richard,

Thanks for the advice! Now that you mention it, the term "tickle" does ring a bell and the tech adjusted it via the control panel. As for the other problem, it seems to be intermittent. It's happening on a file and print setting I've been using all year, so I don't understand how it just appears now and then. I'll keep looking. Thanks again!

Scott Meeker
01-07-2015, 1:14 PM
I've fixed the "tickle" problem I mentioned in my last post, so now I'm trying to fix what I initially said was "bold" letters in the middle of a word/sentence when no bold formatting had been applied. Upon examining the engraving with a magnifying glass, I've since learned that what's actually happening is some of the letters have a double image and so they appear bold. The double image is aligned perfectly from a vertical perspective, but it is offset horizontally. Has anyone had this problem? According to the technician, the "X-motor" needs to be replaced.

I'm thinking of replacing this laser. Would anybody care to share some feedback on the laser you have? I'm interested in quality, maintenance, reliability and whether you'd buy it again given what you know now.

Mike Null
01-07-2015, 1:28 PM
On a Trotec that is an adjsutable error. The laser over runs the line slightly making for "fat" letters. There are two or three adjustments to fix the issue on the Trotec but I don't know about the LaserPro.

One thing you can try is to reduce your speed and power by about half and see if the problem remains. That's obviously not a solution but might give you some insight.

Scott Meeker
01-07-2015, 1:51 PM
Thanks, Mike! I've tried decreasing the speed and it does help some, but not completely.

Gary Hair
01-07-2015, 2:21 PM
According to the technician, the "X-motor" needs to be replaced.

I'm curious who that technician is? I have an explorer ZX and have never seen intermittent bold letters like you are describing, but I don't think I'd attribute it to a motor, especially a $600 motor... Look in your driver for "Image Tuning" and see what value is set there. That setting accounts for backlash and could have an affect on your letters. Laser a 1/4" square on black anodized aluminum and look at it under magnification. If the sides look fuzzy then you can change the value in image tuning. The manual has examples that make it easy to do. If all else fails, email me and I'll reply with my phone number.

Gary