10 watt PRO laser with an extended air nozzle ver 2.0
Endurance Laser Shapeoko Quick-Start Guide (FULL PDF GUIDE)
Step 1
First, locate the PWN and GND ports on the Shapeoko control board. These are the ports the Endurance Laser Box will connect to and allow the laser’s power to be modified.
Step 2
Locate the PWM & GND cables coming from the Endurance Laser Box. There should be two cables that are not connected to anything yet, one should be black (GND) and the other should be red (PWM). These are the PWM & GND cables you will need to solder to the Shapeoko control board.
Pro Tip: If you plan to mount the Laser Box on the exterior of an enclosure you may need to extend the wires to the laser itself. Furthermore, cutting and rejoining more segments of wire will not interfere with any component of the system.
Step 3
Solder the PWN and GND wires to the Shapeoko Control Board as shown in the photo below.
Step 4
Download a vector-based laser software. There are many software options for using a laser on a CNC, examples include: Laser CAD, LightBurn, Fusion 360 and Adobe Illustrator just to name a few. Once downloaded the next step is to enable the laser mode via GRBL settings. Changing the GRBL line $32=0 to $32=1 will allow the laser’s intensity to be controlled when executing Gcode files.
After downloading the vector-based software and soldering the two wires you are all setup to engrave and cut with your Endurance laser.
Mounting
Mounting the Endurance laser on the Shapeoko is completely your preference and there are lots of ways to do so. Below is one method of mounting the Endurance laser on the Shapeoko CNC.
Mounting Continued
Cable Management
Depending on where you mount your laser box, you’ll likely need to thread the cables along the same path as the spindle cables are run. The arrows shown in the images below illustrate the proper wiring placement.
Do you have a Shapeoko 3 XXL? This, bud, is for you!
So, now that you have your laser, how on earth are you going to attach it to your Shapeoko? Here’s a step-by-step article, with lots of photos and material list, on how I made an easily detachable mount to go onto my XXL.
Read more … on Acclaim Crafts – How to Install an Endurance Laser onto a Shapeoko
Cutting with a 10 Watt Endurance Laser
Now that you have your laser mounted and fired up, what can be more exciting than using it to cut something? Anything! But what if we’ve never had one before? What can it cut, and what settings do we need? In this article, I go into the testing I did, the settings I used, my observations, and some practical tips for cutting through five different kinds of common wood.
Read more … on Acclaim Crafts – Cutting with a 10 Watt Endurance Laser
Photo Engraving with a 10 Watt Endurance Laser
If you’re a long-time laser engraving pro, you might want to pass this one by, but, for relative noobs like me, you might find a good starting point to get going with laser engraving on wood. Here, I use two types of commonly available materials, Baltic Birch Plywood and solid Bass Wood, to engrave a photograph using various settings in LightBurn on my Endurance and JTech lasers.
Read more … on Acclaim Crafts – Photo Engraving with a 10 Watt Endurance Laser
Acclaim Air Assist Nozzle for Laser Cutting
This article covers my Air Assist journey using an aquarium air pump with various delivery methods/nozzles. These include a simple metal drinking straw to which I later added a sports ball inflation needle, a handcrafted prototype of a nozzle made from caster wheels, and finally the carefully designed and 3D-modeled version which I hope some of you will want to print and try for yourselves.
Read more … on Acclaim Crafts – Acclaim Air Assist Nozzle for Laser Cutting
Compatible mounts (STLS
https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3374959
https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3877550
https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3586211
