Glowforge Pro's head is moving but not cutting and unsatisfactory CS

[alancheung]

Laster cut Stand _1 of 3 (plywood).pdf (44.9 KB)

Trying to cut the board as shown in the pdf and using the setting in the picture above.
It worked for awhile until it suddenly not cutting anymore but the head keeps moving.

After running around 8-10 cuts (each cut is around 6 mins), the laser was no longer engraving or cutting but the head unit keeps moving. I went through safety manual and even start up manual I could found and also make sure the head plugged in, clean, and the mirror was in correctly, but it still did not function properly.
The laser seemed to get weaker until it died on its own after 8-10 cuts. The 5mm plywood that provided by your company has got a little bit over-burnt (shown by the below photos) in the machine’s last cut but I did follow the setting that glowforge provided.

I did try to contact CS, their reply is asking us to send back the unit without explaining what’s happening/broken and just keep saying it’s not something they can resolve remotely without explaining further. I find it hard to justify paying the courier fee which is a thousand dollars without knowing what’s broken, and to be honest the service is rather disappointing, I made my pre-order back to as early as 2015 and only receive the unit in Sep 2019, and the machine stopped working in just a few months and I am not even using it frequently, and the CS is like that.

I wonder if anyone has similar issue on the machine? Appreciate if anyone can shed some light and guide me to a fix. Even better would be the CS team of glowforge reply me and work out a fix or better solution together.

Thanks everyone.

[Jules]

I am not a Glowforge employee, and I’m sorry, but I think you will want to send that back in so they can fix it or replace it. If it’s a power supply issue, (which is what that looks like to me from the pictures), they will need to repair it for you. It would be dangerous for you to try to do it. And it would be dangerous to continue to run it. (Unplug it from the power source.)

The label for that sheet indicates that it is 3 mm material, not 5 mm, so if you were using the 5 mm settings with that face turned down you would get a significant amount of overburn, but I have never seen that wide a kerf pattern on a cut and it looks like the power is fluctuating. And possibly a problem with the focusing mechanism. IF that is what it is, the repair could run up to $1000-1400 or more on top of the courier fee, unless your machine is still under warranty. These machines cost a lot to repair. (All lasers do, the repair costs on these are actually a little low compared to the other ones I’ve checked.) But they do require special jigs and equipment to fix them, and specialized skills, so while the initial cost is low…repairs tend to be on the expensive side. In order to save you the shipping costs on future potential problems, they will repair anything wrong with the machine that they find while they have it, so it should come back in good condition, but they will charge for anything that needs to be repaired/replaced.

If your machine is still under warranty, they will perform the repairs at no additional charge to you. But if you are international, you will still be responsible for the courier fee.

They are not going to know what needs to be repaired/replaced until they can examine it though, so in order to find out what the repairs are going to cost, they have to look at it.

I’m sorry, I know it will be a difficult decision to make. If you are still under warranty, you will definitely want to send it in for repair. If not, you might decide that it makes more sense financially to try to find a local laser instead of trying to repair that one. It might be cheaper for you.

The repair costs are high. A handful of folks have complained rather bitterly about it here, and no one likes the fact that it has to be sent in to be examined to determine what the repair costs are going to be. But they will contact you with the cost to repair it before proceeding with the work, and you can always make a final decision then.

Hope that description of the process helps, and good luck with your decision.

[pip]

I’m so sorry for the trouble.

Unfortunately your unit is having trouble with either the laser tube, or the power supply… neither of which can be repaired in the field.

I want you to have a reliable unit, so I’m recommending we replace this one. I’ve already emailed you so we can work out the details.