Upgrade from 40 to 60 watt

[Jim Reinhard]

I am going on 5 years with my 40 watt and it is starting to lose some power.I was thinkig about upgrading to 60 watts.Any experience lately with either bell laser or laser-tech.I sent an e mail out and both have responded fairly quickly.They are offering a good price to swap out the tube and power supply.I have a 40 watt synrad . bell laser said they would replace with a coherant c55l ?I asked him about his location .He was honest saying seattle is a po box .and the laser stock come out of PA.

[Craig Matheny]

What are you doing with the laser? Hard to answer with out that info

[Jim Reinhard]

What are you doing with the laser? Hard to answer with out that info
Maybe I gave to much info in my previous post.
The question is has any one had any recent experience with bell laser or laser-tec?

[Craig Matheny]

No that counts me out I have a 40 and a 60 watt epilog was not sure what you needed good luck

[Jim Reinhard]

Thanks any way craig,
To add to this I was told my 40watt firstar can be recharged to close to 60 watts and the output lense change to add more power while still use my 30 volt ps.Any thoughts on this from anyone.

[Keith Winter]

Sounds fishy. If there were really no ill effects everyone would use 30w power supplies for 60w lasers. I don't know much about Chinese lasers but this sounds like trouble IMO, too good to be true.

[Jim Reinhard]

Hi gcc is actually made in Taiwan and has a USA made synrad firestar tubes.
The recharge is in USA by evergreen tech.
From what more I have been reading most new tubes start out over the specified wattage and these can suposedly get charge close to 60.then for the added output
He gave me this explanation.

The output coupler is the partial reflector where the beam comes out of the tube. It Usually lets out only 10% but I can up it a bit and let out 12-15%. Too much and you start losing power. It's a balancing act and properly done the laser actually runs cooler.
For the price I think am going to give it a try .

[Craig Matheny]

Charge yes, they can make them hot mine are about 10% high not sure you will see a 20%+ increase. Changing lens not so much there are debates on it here at times it is splitting hairs. If you have a 1 1/2" fp lens and trying to cut thick wood a 2" fp or 3" fp would do better hence improvement.