Rotary attachment for the lasers?

I’m looking to etch some Yeti style tumblers with a logo and wondering if the space has a rotary attachment for either of the lasers?

[edited to move to Space Teams>LASERS]

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Hey Chad. There is a third laser that can do it. I’m not 100% sure how ready it is to run. If the laser is not ready. Check out Austin Engraving Solutions. Austin Engraving Solutions

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Pearl, the 100W RF CO2 X100 (“Royalmark” rebrand), is there for rotary work. It is a 100W RF CO2, so it’s actually quite overpowered for the job.
It is a dedicated machine, so the rotary doesn’t need to be set up and broken down.

Rotary Manual:
http://service.ulsinc.com/support/Manuals/Manuals%20M_V_X,%20XL%20VL/Legacy%20Rotary/MVX%20Rotary%20Fixture.pdf

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Do we need to take a class? Can we just print to it from Illustrator or Corel Draw?

Pearl a Universal Laser machine, so it uses a Windows print driver that works much the same as Blue. Its graphical appearance is more basic than Blue (oddly, its driver is actually a bit better than Blue’s technically, though) and it’s well supported with Win10 updates this year. So, it prints from Corel, Illustrator, Inkscape, etc.

I don’t think there’s a machine associated with it right now. It ends in a USB cable. The Win10 driver is here:
http://service.ulsinc.com/support/Drivers%20&%20Firmware/Drivers_M_V_X/Windows%2010/DRIVERDISK_COMPRESSED%20REV%20N.zip
I’ve just put it on my Windows laptop and printed to it. The mfg doc on how to use it is quite good and simple (if you find the “_simplified.pdf” doc from Universal, though, don’t read that one- it’s oddly poor and confusing). Haven’t had a significant volume of people looking for rotary regularly to run as a class, but the thing is, the instructions are all of 8 pages (much of which is setup, which is unnecessary as we leave it installed), and pretty straightforward to read and use from if you’re already familiar with Blue or Red.

Now that I think about it, it doesn’t have a Skedda column yet, though.

Will one of the old laser machines work for it? Or one of the new donated machines? I don’t think most people have machines running windows 10 or the patience to install drivers, and I don’t want people acting in confusion. Let’s get a dedicated computer so that it’s fully useable.

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Any Windows machine would work fine. If you want to use Corel or Illustrator, it would need a copy of the software of course.

The laser needs a class, If Someone wants to use it they need to develop the class materials.

One of the OptiPlex’s that are being refurbished are dedicated for this laser. Once that’s set up with Corel/Illustrator and laser drivers the class materials can be completed. @Harlan has been waiting for the computer to get set up and will help with the documentation but if others want to help they can contact me. Should have a computer for it next week set up.

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Thanks all for the replies. Following up on this last comment.

Eric, do you know if the PC got setup? And the status/need for a class for users already trained on red and blue? I have used the red and blue lasers a lot in the past but haven’t really been to the space since COVID.

@Cfranke Not quite yet, it will be done this week. It is different enough to require its own class for now. Eventually it can be merged with the Red laser class.

We are tweaking some class requirements such as increased documentation etc.
I will also post those here in a few days.

Eric

How are the updates coming?

I could probably make it to the space this weekend if it would be helpful to have a student for the first class test run.

Honestly, the material ULS already provided (linked above) is excellent and suitable for our class. It is very concise, accurate, and complete material, with pictures. I don’t see why we would add to it. In fact I’d rather we didn’t.

The only thing to add for instruction is the location of the cooling system and fan switch.

New operation manual location:

http://service.ulsinc.com/support/Operation%20Manuals%20and%20User%20Guides/Old/Manuals%20M_V_X_%20XL_VL/Legacy%20Rotary/MVX%20Rotary%20Fixture.pdf

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Thanks Danny. I’m confident I could use this manual and figure it out. Just want to make sure that:

  1. The equipment is safe and operational?
  2. Hackerspace leadership is ok with me (and presumably other laser trained members) to use the rotary attachment without any further training?
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That’s not the process. @J-LoM is helping with the documentation/installing the drivers on the computer I set up over there. If you would like to help with that you can reach out to james or me. But until that’s completed properly which means documenting the operation/cleanup etc with the setup we have(not a generic manual) it’s not to be used for personal use.

Thanks ,Eric

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FWIW, I think we’re fairly close. Fighting a bit with the driver install process on the new computer, but I was able to run a test with my laptop this weekend so it’s definitely possible.

The ULS manual is a good starting point, as well, but I am planning to write up a quick guide with more details like how to use Illustrator with the driver. As Danny said, it’s similar… but different in some key ways.

My goal is to get back into the shop this week and hopefully make more progress.

-James

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Thanks Joe and Eric. Let me know if I can help. Happy to be a trial student.

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Made some progress tonight. I got the driver installed and it is basically functional.

Unfortunately, we still need to figure out a some glitches in the workflow. Two of them can cause the laser to cut at the wrong coordinates, so obviously that’s pretty important to hash out. Some details:

  1. I tried two separate AI files with basic test patterns. Even though the coordinates configured look identical across both files, one of them cut at an offset of ~3" in the negative X axis. On my small test work piece, that mean that it was running the laser full power to the left of the actual piece. No actual damage in this case, but that’s only because the 3" offset happened to just hit the metal rotary hub only.

  2. A couple times tonight, it seems like the USB driver or print queue got stuck. I would print new jobs but they would not show up on the laser itself. I suspected a USB port/cable issue, so I disconnected it and moved to another port on the PC. Suddenly jobs showed up. I suspect this is a Windows print queue thing, like we apparently sometimes see on Red?

  3. One of the times I switched ports, it did something really crazy: the laser powered on and started rastering across the entire X axis. I had never sent it artwork with those bounds, and it started running without me hitting the start button on the device! I stopped it before it caused real damage, but there’s now a burn mark on the yellow warning label of the rotary device. No idea why that happened.

I expect we can deal with all of this, but it may take some troubleshooting. In the meantime, I believe I have all the screenshots and notes I need to document the general process.

@EricP is also looking into swapping out the computer (it works, but really struggles with Illustrator and anything with heavy disk access) as well as a few nice-to-have bits like a dedicated focus jig.

@dannym, @EricP: I’m assembling a manual document right now. Unfortunately, the ULS link to their official PDF file appears to have gone bad (possibly temporary – pretty sure I loaded it earlier this week, but neglected to save a copy). Do either of you happen to have a copy handy that you could email to me? There’s definitely some useful content in there to incorporate into our guide. I believe there’s also a copy saved on the new computer, but I’m not planning to head in there this weekend.

Here’s the link I’m trying to download.
http://service.ulsinc.com/support/Manuals/Manuals%20M_V_X,%20XL%20VL/Legacy%20Rotary/MVX%20Rotary%20Fixture.pdf

@dannym @EricP I did manage to find the full manual for the ULS “X-Class” lasers… It seems quite similar, if not 100% identical. I’m guessing from the RSX-1832 designation, maybe this laser is effectively an X-class device, though?

http://service.ulsinc.com/support/Operation%20Manuals%20and%20User%20Guides/Platform_M_V_X/Platform_X_Series/Operation_Manual_X%20Class.pdf

FWIW, this PDF I think has the most useful image that I want to use for the rotary guide, so can possibly just use that. I hope we find the specific rotary guide again, though.