How does laser cutting work?
As the name may suggest, this is the process of cutting a material using a laser beam. This can be done to either trim down a material or to help cut it into complex shapes that more conventional drills would struggle with.
This process also has many similarities to the drilling and engraving processes. The former involves the creation of thru-holes in a material or dents, like an engraving used in the later process. These dents and holes are essentially cuts, and you’ll often see a cutting laser machine also being used for drilling and engraving too.
A vast range of materials and thickness sizes can be cut with lasers, making it a handy and adaptable process.
What are the consumables?
As with all CO2 laser machines, the tubes, mirrors, lenses, laser power source, and controller have to be replaced with use.
How can I choose the best machine for me?
There are three key questions to ask yourself when deciding on a machine:
What is your primary use (cutting, engraving etc.)?
Which materials are you looking to work with?
What size of material do you need to process?
Why should I buy a laser machine?
Laser machines are a highly versatile method of altering the properties of materials – laser cutting, laser engraving, etching, marking etc.
Lasers are the ideal technology for working in a wide range of job types and applications. They can both cut and engrave a wide range of materials, giving you professional products in a few simple steps.
CO2 lasers offer you the ability to cut and engrave varying thicknesses of materials such as acrylic, MDF, plywood, paper/card, and many, many more!
For metal cutting, there is a range of technologies available, depending on your requirements: high-powered CO2 (RF) lasers, fiber lasers, plasma cutters, and waterjet machines.
Please contact our sales team to find out which machine is best for your specific requirements.
What is Fiber laser cutting?
This type of cutting is completed using a fiber laser, the type we manufacture here at SPI Lasers. Like the crystal method above, fiber lasers belong to the solid-state group too.
A beam is created using a ‘seed laser’, which is then amplified using glass fibers and pump diodes. They have the same wavelength as above, 1.064 micrometers. This means that the beam for a fiber laser is roughly 100 times greater than that of a C02 equivalent when it comes to intensity. It also means that they can work with both metal and non-metal materials.
A fiber laser is the most useful of the three types. Alongside the benefits listed above, they are often maintenance-free, require much cheaper replacement parts, and have a much longer service life of around 25,000 usage hours.
