The Dallas Makerspace has placed an order for a new laser cutter with Thunderlaser in China. The model is a Nova 63 with a 130 watt tube. It will come with three different focal length heads and a rotary attachment. If you’d like to familiarize yourself with the new laser cutter there are some links below.
Thunderlaser sales folks said it takes approximately 10 days to produce the laser cutter. Form there shipping from China to Houston will take a little over a month (32 days on average from previous records). Once it arrives in Houston it will go through customs and then it will be delivered to the Dallas Makerspace. Based on current information the new laser cutter should arrive around 50 days from now.
The total cost is expected to be around $15,000 which is slightly more than what we paid for the Full Spectrum ProLF 36x24 that we have currently which was around $14,000. The plan is to replace the Full Spectrum Laser machine with this new machine. The fate of the Full Spectrum Laser machine is still to be determined. As new information becomes available I will update this thread.
The new laser has been assembled. Thunderlaser sent this video of the machine this morning. Next step is paying for the machine, filling import papers, and then waiting for a while. I’ll post again when the machine has shipped.
Thunderlaser sent some photos of the machine being packed up for shipping. Today it left the factory and is on it’s way to the docks. Next week there will be some paperwork to do and it will get loaded on a boat headed to Houston.
The wavelength of Nd:YAG is well suited for cutting and engraving metals. It performs poorly on basically every other material (like wood, acrylic, leather, etc.). It would be nice to have a Nd:YAG laser but it’s definitely not the end-all and be-all super laser you describe it as.
It will likely be an auction style sale where it gets posted for a week or two and we take the best offer. So I’m not really sure what the price will be. I’ll create a new thread on Talk at the appropriate time.