Storing Glowforge On It's Side

Hi All. I’m trying to save space in my shop area, one idea I had was to make a flip table and mount the glow forge to it- like a mini Murphy bed.

I figure the laser head travels to the back position at the end of a job, so as long as I put it back gently, would there be any other issues?

Originally I was going to make a simple drawer for it, however it would stick out a bit which is annoying. (My shop is also my office).

Behold a diagram.
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There is a sealed fluid filled reservoir in it…I’m not sure how well that would hold up to repeated rotation. Plus it might introduce air bubbles into the tube, which would have to be allowed to be pumped out each time you turned on the machine. (Might want to keep it horizontal. You can put it on a sliding shelf that you can pull out from under a table though…one of our guys, @PrintToLaser, has a beauty that he built for his shop.)

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I would think at the very least you would want to reinstall the essential orange bits each time you tipped it. Maybe @jbmanning5 would have some insights on this since he moves his machine a lot.

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I wouldn’t do a Murphy bed approach, not with the history of them leaking. I know they’ve recently revamped the container cap for the cooling tank - maybe you can get one of those, if you ask nicely.

And if I did that approach, I would certainly lock it down. You’re going to need to remove the crumb tray every time as it is.

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Sounds like I’m going with a drawer then. Problem is the tables are 24". The vent piping makes it stick out.

This was my solution to limited space, heavy duty full extension drawer glides.

Google Photos

Google Photos

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Nice slides soution. I’ve been looking at heavy duty lazy susan bases too, to allow me to make a way to rotate the GF in place for pass through. I almost never want to use the passthrough all the way through, and more likely use it by hanging material out of the GF front. It’d be nice to have the option.

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That’s a good idea!

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