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View Full Version : Which Laser To Purchase!



mike klein
07-25-2005, 12:35 PM
Hello to all. I have be doing my research on the laser engraves over the last 6 months, still not bought one, to many unanswered questions yet.




I have seen a live demo of the Epilog line and was very impressed with it. I'm leaning more to the Laserpro or Pinnicale due to the ability to insert larger items by having the pass-thru doors.




One of my big concerns is the support. The Epilog rep is only a 5-6 hr. drive from here, while there is no rep for the Pinnicale machine in this area that I am aware of.




I have been reading the posts here in regards to the Corel non-support issue by certain companies, but that don't bother me, its the support you get on the equipment, and the response time when you need parts.




The work I will be doing with the machine would call for such a machine as the Pinnacle or Laserpro with the pass-thru doors. The Epilog rep naturally has safety issues he is concerned about with a open machine in use.




According to Signwarehouse, there is no need to be concerned about this as the machine has many safety gizmo's built into it. Who do you believe!! I would appreciate any input from folks using the Pinnicale...Mike

Rodne Gold
07-26-2005, 12:11 AM
There are some issues with pass thru , the danger of getting "hit" by a stray beam is pretty remote to non existant, tho GCC DO provide laser glasses which I would wear when working open for safety sake.
Obviously your extraction system does not work so venting fumes and smoke is problematic , air assist should blow smoke away from the laser head , but running in an enclosed space is not a great idea or at least having a vacuum cleaner for some evacuation is a recommendation.
Pretty obvious is the lining up thing , if you have a continuous graphic of lets say , 2 m you need to be extremely careful lining up where the first engraving ends and the next one starts. Also , you cannot lay extremely heavy stuff on the table , it wont bear the weight and vey long thin stuff will bow on the table as the ends droop outside it , so some sort of adjustable support for this type of stuff is needed. Also bear in mind you need space fore and aft of the laser if you intend to pass stuff thru.
The only safety gizmos the laser has are door interlocks , the laser will NOT fire if any door is open , to use pass thru you have to actively disable these (magnetic sensors on the front door which you use magnetic badge backs or the like to fool them into thinking the door is closed) there are no other safety feature present or indeed needed.
Pass thru is nice , but if you don't have a specific application for it , I wouldn't let it influence your decision that much , we use it rarely. We do actually often use the front door opening tho , as this STILL allows the evacuation system to work and you insert the oversize piece , engrave the top 1/2 , turn the piece and engrave the bottom 1/2 , also takes a bit of juggling re positioning and lining up. The biggest piece we have done is a 3m x 1m panel in 6mm acrylic on our Exploreres.

Robert Stremcha
07-26-2005, 3:00 AM
If your rep is 5-6 hours away, he might as well be in China; you will have about an equal chance of seeing either one after the sale.



As for not worrying about software support, that is a very short-sighted view, since you will need software, (probably Corel) to do ANYTHING on the machine. When you run into a problem, the laser people tell you it is a software issue, and they don't support it, where do you go? I would not buy a software-dependent machine without software support from the manufacturer.

James Stokes
07-26-2005, 7:52 AM
I have 2 lasers, Differant manufacturers. The first I have had a lot of complaints about, but there are things I like very well. I can set home to any position on the table and start there. I can start from top right corner, center or bottom left corner. This makes it nice for odd shapped pieces. My new one only starts from manufacturer's home which is top left corner of machine. This makes setup much harder.

I have Conical air assist on the first machine, it blows directly in to the cut and works great, New machine air assist blows across cut and is all most useless. On new machine the exaust does not work well enough to keep smoke off the lens and it gets dirty very quick. I broke my first lens after only 30 minutes of use because the lens got dirty.

One more thing I like about the old machine over the new one. I store all files on my computer then can acess the differant directories from the laser to pull up any file I want. On the new laser, the file has to be sent to laser then run. It is limited by lasers buffer. When the laser is shut down all files are dumped and when you want to rerun that job at a later date you have to resend to run.

If I was buying a new laser these are things I would look at.

Bruce Volden
07-26-2005, 9:08 AM
If I had my choice of machine, and the funds, Kern Laser would be my top choice! No more multiple mirrors, no weight restrictions on table, and fairly close if I had to make a run to the company. I was up to Wadena MN a few years back to see his operation, I left very impressed.
There of course a few things they lacked and I made sure I pointed them out to Gerry. He said at that time they would work on them. Never been back there to see if they followed up. My $.02 worth ???

Robert Stremcha
07-26-2005, 10:01 AM
You should take another look! I have had my Kern for almost a year, and it was like going from a Yugo to a Rolls Royce. I've spent almost zero time fixing the machine, and the beam quality is far superior to other lasers i've seen. I have probably cleaned the lens only 6-8 times in the last year; it is pressurized, and you can blow a strong stream of air straight down the beam into the cut. The vacuum table holds parts (and warped plywood) down flat to the table. I hardly use my other laser anymore because it just can't match the quality of my Kern. Their support if you do have a problem is superb, they're a great bunch of people to work with.

Brent Perkinson
08-11-2005, 12:05 AM
I'm not sure what type of work you will be doing but I do see your interest in the pass through doors and safety. I have a CamTech LaserMaster L20 with a 4x8 foot bed with no weight restrictions on the bed and the option to remove the whole thing with ease. The beauty of this machine is that when you do the larger jobs with the table removed the actual laser itself lowers into place and adjusts to the material so your safety is the same as always and also the air and extraction systems travel right down along with the laser.