Looking for upgrade advice.

[Jacob John]

Good morning everyone,

Like the title says, after only a few months of owning my Epilog 35w, we're considering an upgrade. While I love my Epilog, and will keep it and continue to use it, the realization has set in that I feel the need, the need, for speed!

In engraving some items, I've very visibly noticed how much time it's taking, and 35w just isn't cutting it (pun intended).

So I'm looking for advice on both pre-owned and new lasers, would like to stick with the major 3 brands, and am trying to determine what wattage I should consider. There are a few ULS pre-owned systems from 75w to 150w, for instancethe PLS6.150, in 75w and 150w (cost difference of about $7,000. However, like I said I'm not brand loyal even though I love the Epilog I have now.

I want to make sure that I have enough power so that this isn't an issue as we continue to increase orders. We're engraving mainly household wood products. Thanks!

Edit: Forgot to add, I'd like to increase my working area as well.

[Tim Bateson]

There are a number of recent threads on this subject. You will get a huge range of opinions on this subject. My best advice is do a lot of research, then talk to each of the machine reps. A deal I'd get in my area may not be the best deal you can get in yours.

[Jacob John]

Thanks Tim, I've done some searching before making this post, but what I'm finding in threads seems more related to tube upgrades. I'm looking for advice on how to best increase my engraving speeds for wood engraving. I know that there comes a point where increased power would be major overkill, but I'm not sure where that wattage point is. I'm thinking 75w for what we do, and it would be a considerable power upgrade from our 2007 35w Epilog Mini.

Thanks!

[Braden Todd]

Do you have the book/manual that came with your epilog? If you do, or if you can download one online it has all of the power and speed settings for their machines. I'd suggest looking at it and see what power level achieves 100% speed. From there you'll have an idea of what power is needed and what's just extra.

Good luck!

[Jay Selway]

Depends on the detail of the engraving. If you are doing pretty simple line art and text, you can probably get away with dropping your raster resolution to speed things up. Different wood species require different power and speed settings and focus settings. For example cherry I can run at 100/100 and get a great engraving. But for a darker wood, like walnut, I'll often increase the resolution to 1200 dpi, and slow the speed down to 70 or 80. That creates a very dark engraving, which contrasts nicely with the dark nature of walnut. For softer woods like basswood, I'll usually drop the DPI and keep the speed at 100.

I run on a helix 24, with 50w. Most of the time I'm blasting things at 600dpi with 100power and 100speed. I do mostly art pieces though so the engraving quality is paramount.

[Glen Monaghan]

I don't think there is any simple answer to your question for a variety of reasons. One, your concept of what's too slow due to lower wattage versus what's overkill due to raw cost or perceived reduction in cost-benefit analysis is very personal. Another is what effect you are trying to achieve and how you are going about it. You said you were engraving wood products but didn't describe your process or the effect you are going for. Higher power and speed will change the engraving so you may have to change your process. For example, I used to engrave hundreds of a particular wood item each month and relied on low power/slow speed to attain a particular depth with a dark "toasted" mark for nice contrast effect. Any attempt to increase speed required higher power to get the depth needed but then the wood vaporized without creating the dark marking that I needed. I finally made the decision to change my work flow, engraving 10 times faster with sufficiently higher power to attain the same depth, and then using a contrast agent after engraving (usually applied while additional items are being engraved, so not as big an increase in overall time required as it might seem). Despite the extra processing, I was able to get a major increase in my throughput with the current engraver. If you are engraving something like a cutting board, then you have to figure on using a food safe coloring agent if you do this. The species of wood you use will have a major impact on this... I hate engraving red oak because it's hard to get a good burn and the grain structure makes it uneven regardless, while cherry has consistently given me excellent engraving. Something like baltic birch can be all over the map, even within the same sheet of wood, some areas may engrave with great contrast and other areas with almost no contrast.

You'd be wise to schedule some tests with the different vendors to engrave a sampling of your items with your designs and empirically determine how much wattage they can effectively employ at speeds that produce acceptable quality, and determine what price point you are willing to take. From everything I've seen, a Trotec likely will be able to engrave faster at a given power than a ULS or Epilog before quality suffers too much due to mechanical reasons, but what is the cost differential? Similarly, you likely could make use of a more powerful laser tube in a Trotec running at the maximum acceptable speed but, again, what is your cost-benefit tradeoff? Only you can determine what is to your best advantage.

But don't overlook the myriad of other factors that may tip the balance one way or another. Your personal disposition and your familiarity with Epilogs could make learning Trotec's JCL a major pain that you aren't willing to undergo, or Trotec's work flow may provide features that motivate you to change brands, or ULS may offer you such a great deal that you can't refuse, etc.

[Ross Moshinsky]

Figure out what size you want and then get the most power you can afford. I would think going over 100W would likely be overkill. If you simply purchased a 75W Epilog, you'd probably see your production capacity double, and that's without talking about table size, which also has a big impact in production.

I can say I bought a used ULS machine about a year ago and it was not a positive experience and after running it daily, I wouldn't recommend it to others. I wouldn't say I would tell you to avoid the machine, but I think the overall quality of the machine is disappointing.

[Guy Hilliard]

If your only consideration is engraving speed and your maximum engraving size is 12" X 12" (or less) then you are barking up the wrong tree. For the fastest engraving speed in a limited size no general purpose flying optics machine will come even close to a laser with a galvo head. An engraving that takes 5 minutes on a Trotec Speedy 300 / 400 (generally believed to be the fastest general purpose engravers) will be done in seconds with a similarly powered galvo laser. What galvo lasers suck at however is cutting and larger area engraving.

[Jacob John]

If your only consideration is engraving speed and your maximum engraving size is 12" X 12" (or less) then you are barking up the wrong tree. For the fastest engraving speed in a limited size no general purpose flying optics machine will come even close to a laser with a galvo head. An engraving that takes 5 minutes on a Trotec Speedy 300 / 400 (generally believed to be the fastest general purpose engravers) will be done in seconds with a similarly powered galvo laser. What galvo lasers suck at however is cutting and larger area engraving.

Thank you, Guy. I've been thinking about a fiber galvo since I've been receiving lots of knife and gun requests, but I'm definitely concerned about larger engraving areas. Right now, one of my projects (a 15" x 11" piece of beechwood) takes around 20 minutes to engrave at 100 power/35 speed/600 dpi. My return is still worth the project, but I really need to knock these out in 5 minutes if possible.

[Bill George]

I would experiment as suggested by dropping the resolution a bit in the laser set up. I did on my ULS and it greatly increased the speed by just reducing a small amount.

[Jacob John]

I would experiment as suggested by dropping the resolution a bit in the laser set up. I did on my ULS and it greatly increased the speed by just reducing a small amount.

I'll definitely give that a shot. I also have a few calls in to get estimates on a new laser. I still want a main and backup, so this would still be part of my overall plan to have some redundancy. I just don't know which ones to consider. Thanks!

[Bert Kemp]

I think every thing I read here says trotec is the fastest for engraving. with the exception of the glavo but trotec's are pricey. You could send a piece of what you do to each mfg with your spec for engraving and have them tell you how long it takes.

[Keith Outten]

Jacob,

The Trotec Speedy 300 and 400 machines are hard to beat. Their 5G acceleration is a principle reason why they are so fast and the Trotec software is second to none IMO. You should also consider the ceramic tubes to be a major advantage over the life of the machine, something that no other manufacturer is offering to the best of my knowledge.

I'm a Trotec fan so take that into consideration concerning my opinion. I have owned an Epilog and a Chinese laser in the past and operated a Xenetech for many years.
The metrics of engraving the same job (ADA Signs) tens of thousands of times over several years:

Epilog 35 watt = 25 minutes
Xenetech 60 watt = 12 minutes
Trotec 75 watt = 4 minutes
Trotec 80 watt = 3 minutes

[Jacob John]

I think every thing I read here says trotec is the fastest for engraving. with the exception of the glavo but trotec's are pricey. You could send a piece of what you do to each mfg with your spec for engraving and have them tell you how long it takes.

It's why I'm so tempted to get a fiber galvo, but don't they really not do as well as CO2's for wood products? My conundrum is that I want to expand too into metals, but I also would like to make my 35w that backup to whatever new laser I end up purchasing.

[Jacob John]

Jacob,

The Trotec Speedy 300 and 400 machines are hard to beat. Their 5G acceleration is a principle reason why they are so fast and the Trotec software is second to none IMO. You should also consider the ceramic tubes to be a major advantage over the life of the machine, something that no other manufacturer is offering to the best of my knowledge.

I'm a Trotec fan so take that into consideration concerning my opinion. I have owned an Epilog and a Chinese laser in the past and operated a Xenetech for many years.
The metrics of engraving the same job (ADA Signs) tens of thousands of times over several years:

Epilog 35 watt = 25 minutes
Xenetech 60 watt = 12 minutes
Trotec 75 watt = 4 minutes
Trotec 80 watt = 3 minutes

Wow! Thanks for this information. That's what I've been looking for, for comparison. I've contacted both Epilog and Trotec to get some quotes, and the 75w is what I'm looking at fir both machines. To take my production time from 20 to 3-4 minutes would be insane. Thanks again!