(My videos were too large to upload here, so the links go to where they’re uploaded in my Google Drive)
We did a deep cleaning of the Glowforge at the end of July, and then during a later print the lens cracked. When I lifted the print head to check it, it fell right out in my hand. We ordered a replacement lens and installed it, but now no matter what we do it keeps coming loose after each print. We run a print like normal and everything seems okay (https://drive.google.com/file/d/1N8Cx8WSzlTw6jarlx_p_XEnN6dOiXOZ-/view?usp=sharing), but it doesn’t cut through materials the same it used to, with the same settings we always use. Sometimes when it engraves, you can see it starts to get lighter as it goes (see the photo below), even though the settings are the same and have no variation in power/speed/etc.:
If we put the lens back in, carefully place the print head back on the track, and then take it off again, the lens stays in place. But as soon as we print again, it comes loose again.
Please elaborate. There is no such thing as a “deep cleaning” prescribed by the manufacturer, and the majority of mechancical problems reported here can be attributed to unnecessary/excessive “cleaning:”..
Your lens looks quite different from mine, there appears to be a significantly larger metal bezel around it. I don’t know if that’s relevant or if they just changed the design.
Obviously, as it’s held in there magnetically, there is some reason the magnet is not holding it. Either the lens is wrong or there’s something missing or out of place inside the print head. But it’d be hard to figure out exactly what without having two of them next to each other and comparing. Or at least some clear, non-moving pictures of all the parts.
Seconded. Need better pics. This isn’t unprecedented but it’s not a common issue. If you haven’t contacted support yet I’d start that process now. It’s a good idea to read through the linked threads below, but when you do you’ll see that the bulk of them usually end up with talking to support.
Side note: whenever you remove your head I’d recommend putting a soft clean towel on your tray when removing the head. I always do and I don’t even have your problem. The last thing you need is to damage this lens while you’re trying to figure out what’s going on.
Hi everyone, thank you for all your advice! We were looking closely at the lens again today, and we realized that the replacement lens we received is not the correct lens. Luckily we hadn’t thrown out the old lens, and we just happened to pick them both up and compared them, which is when we found they were different. The original lens from Glowforge is just slightly taller, and when you look closely at them, the beveled lip on the new lens is larger than the original, which is probably keeping it from fitting correctly inside the machine. The lens part itself is also a different size, which is probably why we’ve had so much trouble cutting things too. Here they are pictured side-by-side; the original, cracked lens is on the left and the replacement one we received is on the right.
The replacement lens, as it turns out, is indeed from the American Photogenics company as someone had suggested (one of staff installed it and I hadn’t seen the box until just now, but they just assumed, as I would have, that that was just who manufactured the lenses for Glowforge), but we ordered the lens directly from Glowforge’s website, so I’m not sure how we received the wrong lens. This is the link for the lens we purchased: Printer Head Lens – Glowforge Shop . We’re going to reach out to Glowforge and see if we can get the correct lens, and that should hopefully fix our problem.
