Adding a Laser onto Your LongMill
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- Опубликовано: 21 июл 2024
- Putting a laser on your LongMill or any CNC machine can be a fun and useful tool in expanding your creativity. The LongMill fully supports the addition of a laser module.
Learn more about Sienci Labs at sienci.com/
Why a laser?:
In this application, a laser is used to burn or ablate materials in the CNC machine to cut and engrave them. It works very similarly how many of us would have used a magnifying glass to burn things outside by focusing the sun into a very small point.
Because lasers focus down to a very very small point, you can cut and engrave extremely small details.
Pros:
-/ Ability to cut extremely fine details
-/ No need for workholding
-/ No tools or end mills to wear out
-/ Burnt engravings and edges provide a contrast against the base material
Cons:
-/ Creates smoke and is a fire hazard
-/ Lasers can be very dangerous
-/ Lasers leave a burned edge where it is engraving or cutting, which can be undesirable at times
Laser safety:
Using a laser can be dangerous.
-/ Wear eye protection, specifically laser safety glasses. Never point the laser at other people or yourself
-/ Cut in a well-ventilated area, or have a way to remove smoke
-/ DO NOT CUT/ENGRAVE: PVC, ABS, Fibreglass, and any other materials that emit toxic fumes when cut
-/ Never leave the machine and laser unattended, and make sure that you have the equipment to deal with fires
Choosing a laser:
While there are a couple different types of lasers used in cutting and engraving, the type of laser we’re going to use today is called a diode laser or a solid-state laser. In simple terms, it works very similarly to a LED light, but with the ability to emit coherent light that can be focused into a very small spot.
When purchasing a laser, you want to look for:
-/ PWM (pulse width modulation) control
-/ Power supply, driver, and laser module
You will also want to choose a power rating that works for you:
-/ Lasers can come up to 15 watts of power
-/ The listed power may refer to continuous power or peak power (not the same thing)
-/ Sometimes manufacturers falsify the actual laser power rating, or overclock a diode with a lower rating
-/ Higher power lasers typically do not last as long
Setting up the hardware:
Installing a laser onto your LongMill is fairly easy. I found the hole spacing of the mounting holes on the laser and made a mounting plate out of acrylic.
There are just three major connections to make.
1) Connecting the laser to the driver
Typically, you will find a pair of leads to power the laser diode module and a pair of wires for the cooling fan. I extended these wires to route them through the drag chains.
2) Connecting the driver to the Spindle PWM control port on the LongBoard controller
The laser driver will have a +/- input for PWM (sometimes it is marked as TTL) that can be wired into the LongBoard controller on the Spindle PWM (marked as SpinPWM). Note that if you get the polarity wrong it probably won’t work.
3) Connecting the driver to the power supply
This was just a matter of plugging the two parts together
I routed the wiring from the laser to the driver through the drag chains and connected the driver next to the control board.
And that’s pretty much it.
Setting up the laser in GRBL (the software):
You can find all the info about GRBL and how “laser mode” on this page: github.com/gnea/grbl/wiki/Grb...
To get enable laser mode, connect your machine via UGSPlatform, and send the command “$32=1”. To disable it (when you aren’t using the laser) you can send the command “32=0”.
The other thing you need to look at is the minimum and maximum spindle speed setting. You can pull up all of the EEPROM settings by sending “$$” and finding the number. It should be under $30 and $31. You should set the minimum to 0 and the max to 100. If you are using a spindle that connects to spindle PWM for speed control, you can keep it at the same value, but you will need this number later on when creating your G-code.
Since I am not using speed control on my machine, I will just set it to “30=100” to make things easier.
CAM software for laser:
There are a couple different options for generating G-code for laser.
One very popular one is called LightBurn. It is a paid program ($40 at the time of writing for the licence that works with the LongMill). I found that this one works well and has lots of tutorial videos. LightBurn comes with a 30 day free demo. 
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You guys should sell a laser addon kit for the long mill .
added a laser tree laser and it works great!
Andy wear did you find a wire to connect the PMW? I can't find any laser that comes with this connection.
Thanks for the video! What’s the wavelength of the laser module you picked? Did you pick that wavelength for any particular reason?
I believe the wavelength was 445nm. It seemed to be the most common. If you are planning to cut a lot of a particular material, you can choose a laser that works best with the absorption spectrum of your material.
This is an awesome video. I'm scared though. I'm new to all of this but would love to get something that can cut out designs in wood. Do I need the laser? Or can the CNC by itself actually cut out thin mdf wood?
Hey there, the CNC is generally designed to cut using a spinning end mill, with the laser being an optional attachment. The laser is optional but we just wanted to show folk that you could add one if you chose to. If you're interested in seeing the machine cut wood and other materials, I would recommend checking out the other videos on our channel!
where can we find the cutting file for the mounting bracket?
Hey! Was looking for this as well. If you go to sienci.com/dmx-longmill/open-source-and-modifications/, and click on the link to the version 1 of their Onshape file, you can find the laser mount under the sub assemblies folder. Cheers!
Is there anyway you can post the link on where your purchased this model i can not find it.
I can't remember the exact model, but something like this should work: www.banggood.com/450nm-5W-Laser-Engraving-Module-Blue-Light-With-TTL-Modulation-p-1337358.html
@@SienciLabs Seems to be issues with the motherboard with these according to the FB thread in the The LongMill and Mil One User Group. Are you still recommending this one from Banggood? The Jtech one is very expensive. Thank you.
@@ronnieg6099 To be honest I haven't tested enough lasers to know which ones to recommend if not one of the very expensive ones. I guess there's a risk that a cheap one will not work correctly. I got lucky with one that works fine, but I don't want to post the one I got because I cannot vouch for the quality that other people might get. Perhaps what might be better is to purchase a budget laser from Amazon as they may be able to provide more recourse for defective products than Banggood or other Chinese retailers might.