Anyone know anything about laser cutting parameters?

[Munkul]

I'm sick to the back teeth.

We have a kimla cnc laser which has been upgraded with a 12kw IPG source and a Precitec procutter 2.0 head.
We have went away from the company who set it up to start with, as they didn't communicate very well and never did what we asked them to. They also got dumped by Kimla.

It cuts pretty well, since we had Kimla Polish guy over to service and set it up.

Now I'm trying to get it set up to engrave part nos and stuff before cutting the parts (hundreds of sheets of 2mm stainless for a big job)

Current kimla dealer don't want to know, they just say they'll get the Polish guy back... But it took months last time.

I literally spent the day tweaking parameters and doing the same logo over and over again... It doesn't help that our power source is oversized and you have to manually disable all but 1 of the modules to get the power down to an engraving level... Finally got it to look decent, but then the PCCAM software won't let me cut in the same program, i have to load a totally new project you'd think it was pretty obvious wouldn't you, you want to engrave a part as well as cutting it, not one or the other!

Anyone else tweaked with lasers before? Anyone with experience with IPG sources?

Before anyone says it, yes I'm well aware that most companies just buy a Trumpf or Amada with integrated source/head/everything and never have any problems whatsoever

 

[ukracer]

I'm sick to the back teeth.

We have a kimla cnc laser which has been upgraded with a 12kw IPG source and a Precitec procutter 2.0 head.
We have went away from the company who set it up to start with, as they didn't communicate very well and never did what we asked them to. They also got dumped by Kimla.

It cuts pretty well, since we had Kimla Polish guy over to service and set it up.

Now I'm trying to get it set up to engrave part nos and stuff before cutting the parts (hundreds of sheets of 2mm stainless for a big job)

Current kimla dealer don't want to know, they just say they'll get the Polish guy back... But it took months last time.

I literally spent the day tweaking parameters and doing the same logo over and over again... It doesn't help that our power source is oversized and you have to manually disable all but 1 of the modules to get the power down to an engraving level... Finally got it to look decent, but then the PCCAM software won't let me cut in the same program, i have to load a totally new project you'd think it was pretty obvious wouldn't you, you want to engrave a part as well as cutting it, not one or the other!

Anyone else tweaked with lasers before? Anyone with experience with IPG sources?

Before anyone says it, yes I'm well aware that most companies just buy a Trumpf or Amada with integrated source/head/everything and never have any problems whatsoever

Try asking @MattH he is the only one I know who used to run big lasers.

 

[MattH]

Try asking @MattH he is the only one I know who used to run big lasers.

I used Cypcut and you could engrave and cut in the same program.

 

[Munkul]

well, its only taken 4 weeks, 3 different companies, 2 remote sessions and countless phone calls and emails, for someone to finally twig what was going on.
My guy at the UK kimla dealer told me this morning about a specific step in the software that we weren't aware of. Literally a right click and a setting for contours we want to engrave vs cut.

Then the software just works. No faffing with laser power levels, no tweaking parameters, just high quality engraving and cutting within the same program.

Our laser operator: "I think I remember someone showing me that once"