Etcher Laser

That’s me :wink:

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That’s kind of what I see this as… but again, the venting seems like an issue. I’ve got good venting, and acrylic and leather still stink up the room.

Hooked up to some sort of vented workspace this would do a heck of a job in making sure that even leather or acrylics much less cooking odors did not travel beyond your work area. Not cheap but just sitting in the same room with a smoky Glowforge keeps the smells from traveling. Even cooking odors from the kitchen do not pass that central room to the other side of the house if it is on and working.

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I can see potentially using it in my garage, where I don’t need the same level of ventilation, for projects that are too big to fit in the GF; in combination with my CNC.

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I’m not sure where you feel anyone is bashing this product. The people in this forum, for the most part, seem very open to new things, and many people have jumped on startup products that would probably get scoffed at in more “traditional” forums. However, we all know what it’s like to invest in a product that takes longer than expected to be delivered, so we all seem to have a health bit of skepticism.

Having said that, at least among those that post here frequently, I would bet a good number will jump on this if it looks compelling. And, unlike other forums, I doubt you will see anyone criticizing or ridiculing anyone else’s decision to do so.

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I, for one, hereby condemn any and all purchases of anything ever.

Do any of you have any shame? Buying other products?! The nerve.

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Don’t you have more same?

Etcher Laser Pre-orders are OPEN…

I looked at this, this morning, when I received my email that preorders were open. Now that they’ve published prices, this doesn’t seem like that good of a deal. Almost $1000 for a 3.5w laser is a bit insane. I can add something like that to my CNC for much less.

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Yeah but if it sweetens the pot, this one will potentially blind you and also has no ventilation.

WIN WIN

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Haha. I would never buy this Etcher Laser. What a joke!

I suspect there are people who said the exact same thing about a glowforge

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And still do. Folks were trashing the Muse laser before the GF was ever in homes. A very “Glass House” thing to do. It’s like politics. Refusing to acknowledge inconvenient issues with their team, or at least look at pros and cons equally.

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There are lots of situations where the pro and con sides are evenly matched and consequential, and so you should look at both sides equally. This isn’t one of them, as far as I can see. The cons with a laser system are very serious. Be skeptical when thinking of purchasing an item that can blind, poison, and/or burn you.

Sure. I was probably a little too subtle in my post. Haven’t even glanced at the subject laser.

Yeah I gave it a once over, but lost a lot of interest after it was revealed that it’s only 3.5 watts. Just doesn’t fit my use case.

I was still interested in it even at 3.5W. I have a few use cases where it would work, that the GF can’t fulfill, but at this price point, I don’t see the benefit. At this price, I’d rather invest the money in the plasma table that @jamesdhatch purchased.

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That’s my reaction. I think there’s some misunderstanding as to the capabilities - 3.5W in a diode laser is pretty serious. It’s hard to compare to a CO2 laser (watts are not comparable here). There are materials that react better to the different wavelengths.

But at nearly a grand, it’s not different enough in capabilities than the other machines I have. I’d have jumped in for the price of the 1.6 - the delta is pretty stiff for the uptick in power. That and I noticed that I’ve burned about 2K in failed Indiegogo projects so for a minimal savings over expected retail & the projected time frames pushed me into “wait and check back next year” mode.

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This is true. If memory serves, metal reacts much better at shorter wavelengths found in diode lasers, which is why you see 20 watt fiber lasers used to mark metal. I don’t think 3.5w is enough power to do the job, but a given number of watts of diode will do more to metal than the same number of watts from a CO2 laser.

The reverse is true for organics like wood, acrylic, fabric, paper, leather, etc. For all of those, CO2 lasers are much more effective per watt.

So even though it’s 1/11th as powerful as a Glowforge Basic, it’s probably more than 11 times slower for most materials. This is saying nothing about the Etcher, by the way, just talking about 3.5 watt diodes generally.

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I had no idea regarding the wattage differences. Thanks for the extra info James! (And Dan.)

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