laser cutters.....

[Possum]

I wonder how many of you have laser cutters and what issues of ownership and useage and laser type one should consider. I am seeing laser cutters in the $3000 range on Ebay being sold as laser engravers and wonder if these are substantial enough to do the work etc. Five years from now we'll all be able to buy something for probably $1,000, maybe sooner than that. I've read on the net that some have built their own for pretty cheap and wonder if anyone has info or sources for that.

[NightWinder]

$3,000. Ouch!
IS that price for a used product? I was expecting around $10,000. I'd presume you could make real kickass stuff with that(Possum's humbucker covers are the catz ass). Check out technifor.com
A calibrating engineer that works for them lives near me, and is using our pickups. He approached me after buying some pickups and asked if I wanted him to engrave?(I'm almost sure this is the wrong term) our name on the baseplates and lettering on our covers. I have to wait for him to have the lasercutter in his possesion, and he would do some on the side. The Nickle/Silver is too hard for normal engravers.

[Possum]

laser engravers...

no its for a new laser engraver, I'm not sure they are able to cut thick forbon, it looks like they are made in China or something, the pix are very poor, could even be a scam or something, dunno.

Problem with most laser cutter companies is they want $200 just to set up the artwork. F*k me, $200 to copy and paste a bunch of art pieces to fit a space? Rip off. Other problem is most of them don't have forbon in stock to cut and the ones that do are pretty pricey to deal with. Other problem is forbon is dirty to cut so if you send your own stock out to cut they may say we don't want to cut this stuff. Laser cutters right now are about at the stage that laser printers were ten years ago. Ten years ago a simple black and white laser printer cost $10,000 for some thing not as good as one you can buy for $150 now. Back then you could print out a letterhead on a laser printer and sell it for $25 or more. Laser cutters will eventually be quite cheap and it seems there is more competition driving prices down, so if you bought a laser cutter for $10,000 right now you would be making a very bad investment in my opinion.

[WolfeMacleod]

I'll be picking one up. Sooner, rather than later, I hope.
Read my "Incompetent Boob" thrad to find out why.

$10,000 is what you can expect to pay for a good one.

[NightWinder]

technifor.com
They also have some really nice metal engravers (again, not sure about the proper term,etcher?) These are industrial. They will also send out info on the capabilitys too. This would be perfect for you Wolf. Check'em out.

[jason lollar]

your dreaming if you think a 3 grand one will do, your looking at a minimum of 10 grand and I would spend more like 15 or find one that was used for a year and reconditioned for 13.
25 watts is the minimum- with a 25 watter thats actually putting out a bit more than that it takes almost 2 hours to cut 84 strat bottoms.
thats great if you doing reasonable quantities but anymore I wish I had a 50 watterwhich puts you over 15 grand.
Getting the lazer cartridge rebuilt is around 7 grand if I recall- they are like tubes and they do wear out.
dont bother with those littel printer sized ones- they would be OK for cutting post cards etc.

They stink- cutting acrlyic or ABS is god awful poisonous smelling and some plastics will actually put out green clorine gas- you know like ww1- you cant cut that shit.

If you have neighbors its going to smell like your burning trash at the least or you have a meth lab.

[soundmasterg]

We always knew you were hiding a meth lab on that island of yours Jason!

Greg

[David Schwab]

Probably more money in it than pickups!

[Possum]

low priced cutters

I have seen lately on Ebay sizeable 25-40 laser cutters reconditioned for about $4000. Judging by the fact that I'm seeing more and more of these showing up I'd say there may be a new generation of cheaper better cutters about to hit the market this new year. Either that or there are now enough old laser cutters out there that they are getting dumped for newer generation units. Thats why I think it'd be a bad idea to invest that much money in an old cutter. There may be some guys selling kits here eventually too, after all, all a laser cutter is, is a CNC unit with a laser cutter attached, I've read of people making their own but no plans for sale etc. These kinds of computer technologies change pretty rapidly, one sign of that is the smaller laser engravers now widely available for not all that much money. Presumably you could cut forbon with multiple passes, but yeah they are probably more trouble than they are worth with underpowered lasers. I'll get something eventually but its gonna be a year probably before I get that far....

[jason lollar]

I have seen old ones too really cheap but look at the control panel- alot of them are like 80's dinosaurs. The laser has an internal computer just like a printer- get something ten years old or more and it could be more work than its worth.
If you dont or cant get everything alighed perfectly in the laser and all the moving parts you cant cut consitant parts.