Having access to a laser cutter makes it possible to design custom enclosures. This one is for a Raspberry Pi in a Steampunk design:
Steampunk Enclosure
Steampunk Lasercut Enclosure for Raspberry Pi
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Category Archives: Laser
Replacing a cheap Chinese CO2 Laser Tube
What is the life span of a cheap Chinese CO2 laser tube? I mean: how long can I use one these (aka K40) laser engraver/cutter tubes as used in that 50W machine I have? I have used my machine for over a year for now, and I don’t have hour meter, but I estimate it have used it for about 500 hours. I don’t have a data sheet of the tube used inside my machine. Discussions on the internet estimate the live span from DOA (Dead On Arrival) to ‘a few months with moderate usage’ up to 3000-5000h’. Well, whatever it would be: my laser cutter stopped working two weeks ago. Here is how I got it back operating again….
New Laser Tube on the Bench
Lasercut Plywood Board for Raspberry Pi
Need a quick way how to attach a LED, a push button and two resistors to the Raspberry Pi header? One way is to use some ‘flying’ wires. Or to use three pieces of lasercut plywood for a nice looking Raspy extension board:
Wood Circuit Board on Raspberry Pi
Sneak Preview: DIY SMT Pick & Place Machine with OpenPnP
I apologize: I have not been blogging much in the past weeks :-(. One reason is that I’m working on a DIY SMT/SMD Pick&Place machine which keeps me busy most of my spare time :-). I admit that this project is not finished yet, but now is the time I can give a sneak preview: a SMD/SMT pick and place machine:
Pick&Place Machine
Upgrading a Laser Cutter with Cohesion3D Mini and LCD
I’m very happy with my 50W Laser Cutter (see “Getting Control over a 50 Watt CO2 Laser Cutter from China“). My main decision factors were (and still are): Software, software, tools and again software, and down in the list finally the hardware. Same thing for that laser cutter. After several upgrades (see “50W Laser Cutter Upgrades“), it was time replace the stock controller hardware with a new one including LCD display:
New Laser Cutter LCD Panel
Happy Easter Laser Cutting
After all the 3D printing and laser cutting for a Pick&Place project, my laser cutter had something else to do this Easter weekend:
Happy Easter
Using a Laser Cutter and Engraver with Cellulose Acetate Sheets
I’m mostly using my 50W laser cutter machine with plywood, simply because that material is available and very inexpensive. I have used it cutting or engraving PMMA (Polymethyl methacrylate or ‘Plexiglas’), simply because that material is more expensive.
From a reader of this blog I received something to experiment with: Cellulose Acetate sheets. Time to experiment with something new 🙂
Washed off
50W Laser Cutter Upgrades
Using that 50 Watt laser machine (see “Getting Control over a 50 Watt CO2 Laser Cutter from China“) for several weeks now, I have added a few upgrades to the machine.
Magnets
WiFi TFT Touch LCD Weather Station with ESP8266
After the “WiFi OLED Mini Weather Station with ESP8266“, here is another one: this time with Touch LCD :-):
LCD Weatherstation with ESP8266
WiFi OLED Mini Weather Station with ESP8266
I’m convinced that this ‘Internet of Things’ thing-thing is not real. Pure marketing and buz words without any added value, right? The IoT hype is so bizar: it must be originated by aliens which have taken over the brains of all the Pointy-haired Bosses of the world? There is no useful application or use case out there!
But wait! There *is* actually good use case, at least for the geeks of this world. We all love clocks as we want to know the time, and we all love the weather forecast so we can plan accordingly. At least I usually do :-).
SQUIX ESP8266 Mini Weather Station
MCU on Eclipse 