RE: [CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO] Laser positioning? Gantry or lenses?

> Not sure about the cutting action, you'd probably need to vary the focus..
> You could steer the beam with piezo mirrors.
>
> Nearly all laser cutters just move a set of planar mirrors though. The
> gantry wouldn't be that tough. Low Z height means low torques about the
> slides. You could just run it on simple (bearing on angle iron) tracks..
> ACME threaded rod is cheap and easily good for 0.5mm....
>
> PK
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO@yahoogroups.com
> [mailto:CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Abby Katt
> Sent: Friday, 14 October 2005 6:03 PM
> To: CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO@yahoogroups.com
> Subject: [CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO] Laser positioning? Gantry or lenses?
>
> A rather charming lady friend of mine has been asking about a machine to
> "cut out all kinds of fabrics from computer designs", since she does
> professional costuming, it's going to mean everything from silks to
> latex sheet (a nasty one to cut with mechanical tools), so I was
> thinking inert-gas/20W laser.
>
> Now this is something I've been thinking of for a long time, my idea was
> to build a general purpose gantry that will do everything from (wood)
> routing, to plasma-cutting to using a laser. Doesn't need to be
> incredibly accurate, 0.5mm is more than enough. However, this is going
> to be rather complex and cumbersome to build, and in light of my friend
> now pestering me much more, I'm pondering building a laser specific
> machine for just her. So this begs the question, if I'm using a laser,
> can I just get away with some lens arrangement instead of needing to
> build a whole gantry? It is a big area 3x5foot, so I'm worried that at
> obtuse angles the laser will be more of a ellipse than a dot, but is
> this at all possible?
>
> How would you achieve driving/controlling this as the angle of the
> mirrors would not be a linear relation like a mill axis, so you wouldn't
> be able to drive it with say, mach 3? Or is there some neat mechanical
> trick to relinearize it? Or am I just being silly because the shifting
> focal length of the laser will not allow it?
>
> BTW> I won't feel like a real eccentric inventor until I have a laser! :)
>
> Thanks!
> Abby
>
>
>
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> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/jobshophomeshop I consider this to be a sister site to the CCED
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> NOTICE: ALL POSTINGS TO THIS GROUP BECOME PUBLIC DOMAIN BY POSTING THEM. DON'T POST IF YOU CAN
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