Darkly Labs emblaser - affordable laser cutter - review

[JCL]

That's good to know, thankyou. Unfortunately it's difficult to get Rowmark here, so in that case I will try Styrene (outside) and see how I get on.

[monkeysarefun]

Hi all.

 

Hope you are all getting this lovely summer weather ( except today went and spoiled it by raining a little)

 

I'm coming late to the plastic cutting party, but I've finally found the sheet of laser cutterable plastic or whatever its called here that I bought early last year and lost in the June floods.

 

It was hard to track down here, and I'm wondering if its the same stuff that Giles and others use? Its black on one side and white on the other, about .6mm thick and has a peel-off protective clear layer on the white side that I only discovered after I'd laser cut it and was wondering what the weird melted tendrils were that were hanging off it.

 

Anyway, following on from the posts a couple of weeks ago about darklylabs saying that the Emblaser 2 could cut styrene because some railway modellers (probably us) said it could I thought I'd try plastic out.
 

It was A} very stinky and B) tricky to get the setings right. I finally managed this:

 

 

 

After much experimenting this is 100% power, 17.5mm/sec and I did 2 passes. but rather than set the number of passes inside the cutlaser software, I set that to 1, then when it had finished the first pass I hit the 'cut now' button on the Ventric window and it did it all a second time.

 

So, IS this stuff the mythical rowmark or whatever it is that everyone else talks of, and if so, what settings do you use.

Edited February 26, 2017 by monkeysarefun

[Giles]

I use Trotec, rather than Rowmark, simply because Rowmark didn't reply to any of my emails. It sounds much the same, but the stuff I choose to use is all one colour, not the dual colour variety.

 

The 0.8mm thick I go through in one pass at 100% (black) at 6mm/sec.

[monkeysarefun]

Thanks Giles,

 

I did intially try a slow speed and one pass but that was white side up and was very sooty. But that was before I discovered the clear protective sheet that is on the white side, so maybe that was causing the problem. I'll retry your settings on the black side - At least if its still all sooty I won't see it!

Edited February 26, 2017 by monkeysarefun

[Giles]

The white layer will certainly slow it up, and likely need a second pass in consequence.

 

It's very useful material, but if you're going to buy some more, get the black Stuff!

[Beatty 139]

I haven't been on RMWeb for over 12 months due to undertaken a complete house refurbishment, the kind where the only thing I haven't done is to take the roof off or replace the walls.

 

I comecially produce lasercut kits for the larger scales and found out a long time ago there were issue with laser cutting thin plays to the point where we worked with one of the major importers of birch ply to get a supply of birch made with interior grade glues, the importers or Hanson ply woods in Halifax and the contact is Mike Healey, the should be able to advise who they are supplying. They stock 0.4, 0.6, 0.8, 1.0, 1.5, 2.0, 3.0 and thicker it's a perimum product but it cuts reliably time after time which is a bonus.

 

Hope that helps

Andy

[monkeysarefun]

Those using Cut2DLaser may not be aware that there is an updated version now available, accessible via the 'Visit Vectric User Portal' option under the help menu. It installs as a separate programme to the existing version so you can run either.

 

I've only had a quick look at it, the most obvious addition is the ability to select the kerf width, and where you want to cut - on the line, or at a selected distance either inside or outside it.

[flubrush]

Those using Cut2DLaser may not be aware that there is an updated version now available, accessible via the 'Visit Vectric User Portal' option under the help menu. It installs as a separate programme to the existing version so you can run either.

 

I've only had a quick look at it, the most obvious addition is the ability to select the kerf width, and where you want to cut - on the line, or at a selected distance either inside or outside it.

kerf.jpg

 

Thanks for the pointer.  I've just downloaded it and had a quick look round.   Setting an offset will be a big plus point and will save me having to draw offset lines in my original CAD files.  With reference to the kerf width,  I wonder if this requires you to fill in what your kerf width is,  rather than the software setting that width.  I had a look in the help file but that doesn't appear to have been  updated as yet from the original V8.0 version.   "Allowance Offset" also requires a bit of investigation. :-)   A Vectric forum message is probably the best bet at the moment. :-)

 

Jim.

Edited March 4, 2017 by flubrush

[flubrush]

A Vectric forum message is probably the best bet at the moment. :-)

 

 

I did raise the matter on the forum but the Vectric representative who responded didn't seem to be fully up on the latest version.  So I've had a look at the .nc files produced and found the following.

 

The "Kerf Width" setting sets the offset for Cut Inside or Cut Outside - i.e. the cut offset is half of the Kerf Width.

 

The "Allowance Offset" is added to whatever offset is calculated for Cut Inside or Cut Outside using the Kerf Width value.   At the moment I think the "Allowance Offset" allows you to adjust any offset value without having to mess around with the Kerf Width value.   Negative values are allowed in the "Allowance Offset".

 

Note that there is only one option for move speed - mm/sec - whereas the earlier version gave several options.  I'm used to working in mm/min so I'm going to have to change for the present. :-)

 

Jim.

 

.

Edited March 4, 2017 by flubrush

[nick_bastable]

gradually getting back some mojo  today I produced this 

 

 

they are security fencing for the ends of walls /buildings  would be better in stouter material 

 

Nick

[monkeysarefun]

So today I got the email saying that my Emblaser 2 is ready to ship...

[Giles]

You ..... rotter - you....... ours are severely detail by red tape compliance issues!

 

Enjoy!

[DaveyH]

You ..... rotter - you....... ours are severely detail by red tape compliance issues!

Enjoy!

Not jealous at all - honest :-)

[flubrush]

Anyone actually tried the latest version of the Vectric Cut2D.  I only got round to cutting bits on my cutter yesterday after a few weeks doing a lot of other things and this was the first time I had actually put the software to use to cut something. V8.5 Cut2D worked well and the new features (Cut Inside, Cut Outside, etc) made life an awful lot easier on the CAD work.  Previously I had been drawing extra lines offset from edges to get an accurate edge cut with the laser cutting on the extra lines.  

 

But when it came to cutting the files I had generated,  I couldn't get it to send the files directly to the new version of Transfer.  I don't know if this is a fault with Cut2D or Transfer.  However I was able to save the files and upload them to the Emblaser using Universal GCode Sender and all worked well.

 

I went back to have another look at Transfer.  Loading a file into it is not all that obvious but I found that if I clicked on the file name box,  a dialog box appeared to let you select a file.   But if you cancelled this dialog box,  you couldn't get it back again by clicking and had to shut down and re-open Transfer.  Once I had got the file loaded I could send it to the Emblaser.  However,  I then hit a major problem.  My file starts cutting close to the origin at (5,5) and I found that the Emblaser seemed to be trying to cut further left than this and it stalled when it appeared to be trying to get left of (0,0).  I thought I might have lost line up of the machine so I got Transfer to re-home the laser in the top ;left and tried running the file again,  with the same results.  This is the same file that worked perfectly using GCode Sender.   I haven't got any further with the investigations and I'm not sure if I can revert to the previous version of Transfer at the moment.

 

Jim.

[nick_bastable]

previous version is not over written so its still there 

 

Nick

[flubrush]

previous version is not over written so its still there 

 

 

 

Nick,

 

That is so for Cut2D but the new version of Transfer appears to be written over the previous version such that there is only one (the new) version on my machine.  I'll try re-installing the original Cut2D Laser and that should re-install the old version of Transfer.   I'm just off to have another bash around and see what I can find out.

 

Jim.

[nick_bastable]

yes my mistake but the "new" transfer program works with my set up without issues   ( more by luck than judgement I suspect)

 

good luck at finding a solution  can you rollback the pc ?

 

Nick

[monkeysarefun]

I haven't had much of a go with it, other than a small test piece when I first installed the uggrade - .that seemed to go ok.

 

Not sure if you have checked already but  a few other users are reporting various  issues with the new Vtransfer. There are a couple of threads about the problems on the darklylabs site, admittedly  they don't quite match your particular  issue but there are a few troubleshooting steps suggested, and  a link to the older version of Vtransfer and an upated post-processor that  might be worth trying

 

https://darklylabs.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/community/posts/115005610027-VTransfer-stops-part-way-through-a-job-

 

The tail-end of Cyclone Debbie still seems to be hanging around making today grey and miserable - grass cutting is out  (  )  so I thought I'd drag out the laser and spend some serious time with it. I'll let you know if I have any issues.

Edited April 1, 2017 by monkeysarefun

[monkeysarefun]

Well I did drag the emblaser out, but I got side-tracked into using the picengraver software to try out some '3D' laser projects.

 

This uses picsender to send gcode to the laser, rather than the vectric software. Its not really apparent in the pic, but the finished image has an engraved depth to it, not just burnt onto the top of the wood like it looks in the picture.  (The picsender, picengrave and piclaser software applications are available via links from the darkklylabs website.)

 

The software just uses a greyscale image to calculate the depth - the darker the grey at a given point of the image, the more laser  power is applied and thus the deeper the image is engraved.  so I'm thinking of trying it out on my gothic window files once I've worked out how to convert .pdf files to greyscale jpegs, I'm hoping to be able to combine all the individual layers that make up a gothic window file, and assign each layer an increasing greyscale value, and hopefuly the resulting output would be a gothic window with all the tracery at the right depth.  Or a pile of soot.   Anyway, thats my excuse for mentioning the picengrave software here..

 

This is the sort of thing that I'm hoping the emblaser 2 will improve on, mainly due to its air asist system helping to disperse the smoke and make it less sooty and easier to clean up. I did do this outside using natures own air assist - a full blown blustery southerly, but alas,  that is not consistent enough to depend on in the long term. The wood is huon pine, I think darker fine grained ( but sadly un-Australian) hard wood like walnut or cherry might work even better.

 

Edited April 2, 2017 by monkeysarefun

[monkeysarefun]

After just 4 days travel from Melbourne to Sydney (I think it must have gone clockwise..)

 

Its here!

 

Edited April 4, 2017 by monkeysarefun

[Giles]

Although I appreciate your point of view - won't your wife object to its position of honour displacing her on the sofa?

 

You're a lucky chap......

Edited April 5, 2017 by Giles

[monkeysarefun]

Although I appreciate your point of view - won't your wife object to its position of honour displacing her on the sofa?

 

Your a lucky chap......

 

Ha! She has her own house now!  Thats why I can buy laser cutters and sony playstation VR headsets and stay up as late as I like.

[monkeysarefun]

So..... I've finally been on a playdate with the Emblaser 2, and here are initial impressions:

 

The painted orange metal finish and curved edges is a classy look, much better than the usual plastic, or slab sided computer peripherals.

 

The air-assist is LOUD! Think air brush compressor loud. Furtunately there is a setting in Laserweb for turning it off when cutting things that don't require it

 

It cuts thicker thing, which I guess you'd expect. . 4mm walnut in 2 passes at 6mm sec, 3mm MDF in 3 passes at 5mm/sec. The laser head sits a lot higher off the job than the Emblaser 1 – about 50mm instead of 1.5mm, which means that you can set the laser unit to lower by say 1mm between each pass to keep the focus, which definitely seems to help cutting multiple passes.

 

The laser unit is precisely focussed before you get it, which means the cutting width is tiny, and also allows finer details to be cut.

 

The big disappointment right now – and probably because I m still learning it – is the software. Laserweb lacks so much of what the Cut2D software had, and its not all that intuitive and is rather clunky and unfinished. I know its a beta release still under development but it does hamper my ability to  use the Emblaser 2 in the same way I used the Emblaser 1.

 

For instance its major annoyance is its order of cutting things out. When cutting out say a window frame in Cut2D, the software would cut out the internal panes first, before doing the window outline, which is excellent.

 

Laserweb however, takes the same file and cuts the window outline first, which promptly flutters off, meaning the laser engraves the panes into a now blank rectangle. And yes, despite what darklylabs say – it IS possible to engrave through the silicone base mat! As a work around I have to create the outside cut of windows etc as a second layer in Inkscape, and make sure I cut that layer sfter the layer with the rest of the panes in. Its an added step and annoying.

 

Also, the picengrave software that I'd been using tp produce relief images in timber as per 4 posts up the page does not work with the Emblaser 2 yet. Another disappointment.

 

Other than that though, the hardware itself is brilliant, its just the software that needs a bit of a tickle.

 

I have only been doing test cut outs to gauge cutting speeds and abilities, so I have nothing of interest to take pictures of yet.

Edited April 17, 2017 by monkeysarefun

[Giles]

Extremly interesting Chris.

 

Obviously mine won't arrive for sometime, being in the UK..

 

Even with Cut2Dlaser I used to find that the cutting order was a bit random, doing the very thing that you are observing with the II, so I always work with different cutting layers anyway,b so I can dictate the cutting order (easy for me, using Autocad/Draftsight)

 

I've never used Picengrave myself, so I sympathise!

 

Great to hear your impressed with the hardware - but what a shame the software isn't as good....

 

Do keep the info Coming!

 

Best,

 

Giles

[Chriss76]

hello

 

Maybe sameone wants to sale the emblaser 1 A3?

Thansk for info

my email modelman@interia.eu

 

best regards

chris