Thank you for the video! I do have a question, maybe you can help me find an answer. Can this machine do very thin lines of engraving on metal. When I say small, I'm talking about 0.005" in thickness/width?
Good question. The actual spot size of the laser depends upon the lens you use on the galvo head. A lens with a longer focal distance and larger working area will have a much larger spot size than a lens with a short focal distance and small working area. According to Cloudray's website the shortest focal length lens they sell, which has a working area of only 50x50mm, has a spot diameter of a mere 0.0005". The most common lens size is a 200x200mm, and Cloudray claims that this lens has a spot size of about 0.0014". That is of course assuming all other parameters are perfectly set, but I would say that achieving the 0.005" line width threshold should be plenty possible. If you have a test piece you want to try Cloudray is often willing to arrange for a sample marking so you can see if their laser will be suitable for your application.
Thank you so much for the answer. I'll check with them and see if they can provide a sample. Looks like this most likely will work for my applications.@@flare_fabrication
I just got this exact same laser model. Plugged it in released the emergency stop button but when I push either power button they do not turn green or allow power to the unit. No fans moving no noise of any sort. Any idea what I’m doing wrong? Or did I get a bad unit? The emergency stop button is glowing red meaning it has power to it but it’s not engaged and I should be getting power… I’m alittle upset for a 6k purchase
That’s very strange. If I recall correctly, the e-stop button should turn green when released. Are you certain that the e-stop button is released? If so I would recommend getting in touch with Cloudray customer service right away.
When I purchased my first fiber laser I did quite a lot of research to compare many of the fiber laser manufacturers out there. For my budget, I found that the Cloudray fiber lasers had the best prices for the features/hardware that they came with. Cloudray is also a large, reputable laser manufacturer that has been around for a while, so I trusted them to have a quality product and provide support if I had any problems.
Does it come with a red dot tracer? Where it draws out the design for you. I saw it traced the shape, but I’ve seen other lasers trace out the whole actual design. Would this one do that if the design was more simple maybe?
Yes, the guide laser can trace out the exact shape of the design that is being engraved. The laser software has multiple options you can pick from for tracing out the design with the guide laser, and in this case I just used a bounding box method for tracing the design.
Hi there. Thank you for doing more than an unboxing and doing a first color test. I tried the same flag file for the same machine and did not get a good result. Is there anything you did to adjust the file?
Nope, I didn’t make any changes to the file. I had pretty good results from the first time I tried it. Did you get any color at all during your test? There are a number of factors which could impact the results you’d see from this test.
I did get color just dark. Normal red/blue/green did not come out. I will keep playing with it. Just noticed in the Flag file, the "grey" was set to no output. Was wondering if you had flipped that on. I tried it 'on' and still odd outcome. oh well, big learning curve for me. At least your wonderful video got me this far. Thanks again. @@flare_fabrication
@@EdithG-tr1ib ok, got it! If I remember correctly, the grey layer was sort of a base engraving pass, so I turned it on. From my experience every fiber laser is a little bit different, so very seldom will the exact same settings work from one machine to the next. I got pretty lucky in this case, and actually saw sone pretty decent results with the file Cloudray provided. Even so, I could definitely improve the markings with a bit of tweaking. Best of luck to you!
You'll have to do a rotary setup and example as well. Great job! 👍
thank you for this video. very helpful
Thank you for the video! I do have a question, maybe you can help me find an answer. Can this machine do very thin lines of engraving on metal. When I say small, I'm talking about 0.005" in thickness/width?
Good question. The actual spot size of the laser depends upon the lens you use on the galvo head. A lens with a longer focal distance and larger working area will have a much larger spot size than a lens with a short focal distance and small working area. According to Cloudray's website the shortest focal length lens they sell, which has a working area of only 50x50mm, has a spot diameter of a mere 0.0005". The most common lens size is a 200x200mm, and Cloudray claims that this lens has a spot size of about 0.0014". That is of course assuming all other parameters are perfectly set, but I would say that achieving the 0.005" line width threshold should be plenty possible. If you have a test piece you want to try Cloudray is often willing to arrange for a sample marking so you can see if their laser will be suitable for your application.
Thank you so much for the answer. I'll check with them and see if they can provide a sample. Looks like this most likely will work for my applications.@@flare_fabrication
I just got this exact same laser model. Plugged it in released the emergency stop button but when I push either power button they do not turn green or allow power to the unit. No fans moving no noise of any sort. Any idea what I’m doing wrong? Or did I get a bad unit? The emergency stop button is glowing red meaning it has power to it but it’s not engaged and I should be getting power… I’m alittle upset for a 6k purchase
That’s very strange. If I recall correctly, the e-stop button should turn green when released. Are you certain that the e-stop button is released? If so I would recommend getting in touch with Cloudray customer service right away.
I opened it up and wiggled every wire I could reach and now it’s turns on and yes the e stop turned green now. Thanks for replying
@ oh good! Probably just a connection that came loose during shipping. Glad it’s working for you now!
My laser won’t work in light burn for some reason? Marks fine on EZCAD but I always get a “disconnected” status on light burn?
have you found the solution?
Hi, what made you choose Cloudray from all the brands out there ?
When I purchased my first fiber laser I did quite a lot of research to compare many of the fiber laser manufacturers out there. For my budget, I found that the Cloudray fiber lasers had the best prices for the features/hardware that they came with. Cloudray is also a large, reputable laser manufacturer that has been around for a while, so I trusted them to have a quality product and provide support if I had any problems.
This is a really interesting and useful video, thanks. Can you share the settings that you used for your flag test?
Sure thing, I’ve gone ahead and added a link in the video description where you can find Cloudray’s test files
Does it come with a red dot tracer? Where it draws out the design for you. I saw it traced the shape, but I’ve seen other lasers trace out the whole actual design. Would this one do that if the design was more simple maybe?
Yes, the guide laser can trace out the exact shape of the design that is being engraved. The laser software has multiple options you can pick from for tracing out the design with the guide laser, and in this case I just used a bounding box method for tracing the design.
Hi there. Thank you for doing more than an unboxing and doing a first color test. I tried the same flag file for the same machine and did not get a good result. Is there anything you did to adjust the file?
Nope, I didn’t make any changes to the file. I had pretty good results from the first time I tried it. Did you get any color at all during your test? There are a number of factors which could impact the results you’d see from this test.
I did get color just dark. Normal red/blue/green did not come out. I will keep playing with it. Just noticed in the Flag file, the "grey" was set to no output. Was wondering if you had flipped that on. I tried it 'on' and still odd outcome. oh well, big learning curve for me. At least your wonderful video got me this far. Thanks again. @@flare_fabrication
@@EdithG-tr1ib ok, got it! If I remember correctly, the grey layer was sort of a base engraving pass, so I turned it on. From my experience every fiber laser is a little bit different, so very seldom will the exact same settings work from one machine to the next. I got pretty lucky in this case, and actually saw sone pretty decent results with the file Cloudray provided. Even so, I could definitely improve the markings with a bit of tweaking. Best of luck to you!
Is the color unlimited or the machine can get outta color
Can you share that folder?
Sorry for the delayed response. I have just added a link in the video description for the Cloudray test file folder
Are you willing to have 1 on 1 with new users.?
How much?
Current price is $7,000, but they also have a deal right now which would give you $500 off the price.