One thing that may be good about the option to send in the GF for the tube replacement may be to get some options for tune-up or servic of other parts. Obviously that would add some cost, but to me would make sense to other parts checked and replaced.
E.g. first tube replacement everything is working well, replace yourself, but then at the next one, say your GF been cutting along for 3 to 5 years, it may make sense to send on for replacement and pay a bit extra for an overall system inspection and service.
While a good portion of us are quite tech savvy, the GF is also marketed to folks who just want to use it and fiddle with fixing stuff and at that point having an option for a tune up at time of tube replacement may make the downtime much less painful and more value added.
Another related idea. Perhaps prior to sending in a Forge for tube replacement, GF could ship out an empty box for a nominal fee, so we don’t have to store that big box for years.
Both good sugestions
I think that when they said that tube replacement would have to be at the factory, thoughts of any retail sales (Best Buy, whatever) would be nearly impossible --> thus leading to the at home solution which they now have 1 1/2 - 2 years to design, test, and implement. Just my opinion.
Good point. I have no problem with Glowforge wanting to offer this service, I think it’s great, I’m just glad we’ve been given an option. My hope is that customer service is where Glowforge will really set themselves apart from their competition.
What’s the level of skill required to replace the tube yourself? And do other lasers have the same problem?
I’m not sure we’re going to know that for a while, and since I don’t own another laser I couldn’t give a comparison if I wanted to. From other comments being made, I think the problem was they couldn’t simply make it snap-in-snap-out. It will probably take a little careful fine tuning once it’s mounted, but that’s just my guess.
it’s a fairly technical process, though obviously we can’t know the relative complexity compared to the glowforge. if you read all the documentation a few times and watch some videos on youtube, however, you shouldn’t have any problem if you’re comfortable with that kind of thing.
and yeah, every other laser has this problem.
One of the other issues with shipping the GF back is that most corrugated boxes are only rated for shipping once. All packages get banged around and stacked upon each other, crushing parts of the corrugated center.
Back in the old days before Apple Stores, you had to ship a Mac back if you had an issue. Apple would not accept the box your Mac came in because that box could have been compromised during the original shipment. They had boxes at regional UPS shipping centers. The UPS courier would show up with a box, you’d box up the computer in that box and hand it to the courier. Apple sold a lot more Macs than GF has sold lasers, so that would not be a cost effective for them.
Here is Russ giving a demo of upgrading his 40 watt to a 60 watt for his Chinese laser. Gives you some sense of what is required of another laser.
Had seen that video before. Must say that the only thing in the entire process that would require me to have additional thought is how to deal with the closed liquid cooling. Would we need additional fluid at the time of replacement? What is the fluid? Best approach to fill and avoid bubbles, etc?
Not a big deal just requires a little planning.
Does the loop stay full of liquid when the pump is off? It is conceivable it could drain down into a sump when the pump is not running. That would make it easy to swap.
Looks like it stays filled to me. Saw a couple bubbles when it powered up for the very first time but nothing since.
[quote=“palmercr, post:12, topic:6407”] It is conceivable it could drain down into a sump when the
[/quote]
Yeah but that would lead to air in the tube which is deadly to it if you fired it up and the air/bubbles remained.
This will depend on the box design. The company I contract for uses double wall boxes with a custom insert and we ship 3D printers all over the world in them. I have seen the same box come back 6 times before it was not reliable.
Sure you can reship products back and forth in a new box, but If you read the fine print in UPS, FedEx, USPS shipping insurance, they won’t cover damages to the product inside the box unless it is properly packed in a NEW box.
My company learned this the hard way when we shipped a server back to HP in the box it was shipped to us in. The UPS claims rep said if the box had been shipped before, you ship at your own risk even if you pay for extra insurance.
But they take your money for the extra insurance and will only tell you once you try to actually file a claim?
No doubt it’s in the fine print somewhere…
which is so silly for those servers. i visited HP’s fort collins location once to check out their workstation qa; the veritable obstacle course they put packaged servers through to test fragility was a sight to see.
I think postal / courier insurance is just a rip off. If you are a manufacturer I think you can only claim the cost of the item to you, not the retail value you sold it for.
For a company like Glowforge it wouldn’t make sense to pay insurance as they can afford to replace any damage themselves. For example when I was selling 3D printer kits instead of charging my customers the courier insurance rate, which was about 5% of the value and about 50% of the shipping, I charged a much lower rate, about 1% of the value, and replaced any damage from that fund. It was win-win because the damage rate was less than that, so I made a small profit out of the insurance money and the customers got much cheaper shipping. And when there was a problem I didn’t have the hassle of making a claim.
In general in life it only makes sense to insure things you can’t afford to replace yourself or has a big liability. Insurance companies are always going to charge more than the risk as they have to make a profit.