Food for Thought
We are told to use the least amount of milli-amperage as possible to do our work to save the tube. I was just doing some cutting experiments on 3mm birch ply. I cut a 1 inch/24.4 mm circle at different speeds and current settings. So the results are minimum setting on my setup is 4ma @ 3mm/sec = 8.1 seconds of cutting time
9ma @ 12mm/sec = 2.2 seconds of cutting time
So twice the amps at a 1/4 of the time. I wonder which one will lower the life of the tube more and quicker?
That's interesting. It would be nice to know which works out more economical. I wonder is it a linear scale or exponential or some other function.
ReplyDeleteWhich stresses your car engine more, doing the quarter mile in 4 seconds, or doing the quarter mile in 20 seconds?
ReplyDeletegreg greene True, but do we change the oil in our cars in respect to mileage/time or speed (which will stress the vehicle more the faster you drive)?
ReplyDeleteI consider Laser tubes a consumable item ( like sandpaper, paper towels etc.)that will require replacement, and build the cost into anything I do. I would rather be able to make 4 times as many widgets in the same time frame, and use the the money from every 4th widget to buy a new tube when needed. That way I am still ahead of the game, and get jobs done faster.
ReplyDeleteI'm more concerned with the shelf life of the two spares I have in the closet.
ReplyDeleteI don't use my laser enough to worry about "wearing it out".
I guess I best start building a death ray or something with the other two.
I will get them out and hook them up to my spare LPSU. I have only had them for a few months but yeah, I don't want them to go to waste.. I wish I knew someone who did glasswork it would be neat to have a schrader valve or something available to recharge them. I wonder if the RECI tubes could have this incorporated into the metal endcap?
ReplyDeleteI know they have refillable 100+ watt glass tubes.. but nothing in the lower size rigs
That would be something..
ReplyDeletehmmmm..