Blog
Pete Mills from Ann Arbor, MI, shares his Cigar Box Laser Light Show. [via]
It was spring break last week so I had some spare time to kill. I wanted to do a project that would be done fairly quickly and still have some time to study for classes resuming. I do have several other projects going that I could have worked on but, I figured a laser light show would be appropriate for the occasion, being spring break and all. Actually, I have no idea if spring break party goers are the least bit interested in seeing laser light shows but, I am interested in getting some motors spinning programmatically. And to seal the deal there is a new cat in the mix over here so I have buckets full of laser pointers.
Laser Light Show Fits in a Cigar Box – [Link]
Bart from buildlog.net shares his latest DIY laser cutter design, the 2.X laser. [via]
The second generation open source laser cutter/engraver design from buildlog.net is complete. The new machine is called the Buildlog.net 2.x Laser. The name comes from the fact that this is the second generation machine and it is basically a 2 axis design. The third, vertical axis, is manually controlled with an optional upgrade to digital control. The 2.x Laser takes all the optimizations learned from the first laser and all the other lasers documented on buildlog.net forum.
The usable work envelope is 12” x 20” x 4”. The internal design has been optimized so the overall size of the machine is much smaller than the previous design and can easily fit on a small table. It is designed to work with 40W CO2 lasers sealed gas lasers. The frame is built from inexpensive 20mm aluminum T Slot extrusion and the skin is made from a painted aluminum and HDPE laminate.
Open Source Lasercutter Reaches Version 2 – [Link]
Remember the laser based alarm system that you see in spy movies? The one that sets the alarm when the laser gets cut by any object? Guess what, – you can have one at home! And what’s more? You can make one using an arduino! [via]
Arduino Laser Tripwire – [Link]
Jean-Baptiste Labrune and his research group at MIT’s Tangible Media Group have been experimenting with using a laser cutter to turn ordinary materials into printed circuit boards (PCBs). [via]
They have a clever process for making the traces. Since it is very difficult to cut metal with a laser, they can’t start with a solid sheet of metal material and burn away the parts that they don’t want. Instead, they put a piece of masking tape over the material that they want to make traces on, then use the laser to burn off the tape in places where they want metal to be. Finally, they use a paintbrush to apply conductive paint into the newly cut grooves, and remove the masking tape mask. They’ve got some more photos of the process in a Flickr set.
Laser cutting circuit boards - [Link]
oomlout.co.uk has build a wire spool holder using laser cut pieces. The result is simple and expandable. If you would like to build your own check details and construction drawings on the link below. [via]
Wire Spool Holder – [Link]
Joe Grand @ grandideastudio.com is working on “Laser Range Finder” and shares his experience building it on Parallax Forums. He shows how he used a CMUcam to detect the reflected laser beam and calculate range based on triangulation. He writes: [via]
I decided to go with the method of optical triangulation whereas the distance to a targeted object is calculated using triangulation with simple trigonometry between the centroid of laser light, camera, and object. The most compelling example is the Webcam Based DIY Laser Rangefinder (http://sites.google.com/site/todddan…m_laser_ranger) and my design is based, in theory, on this implementation.
Laser Range Finder - [Link]
Phillipe Hurbain build this laser 3D Scanner based on lego modules. This device uses a line laser and a webcam to scan the object. The software used is David laser scanner. Check it out ..
Lego laser 3D scanner - [Link]
gallamine @ robotbox.net offers a $200 bounty to the first person that successfully hacks Neato Robotics’s XV-11 floor vacuuming robot’s laser rangefinder and releases open source documentation/drivers for using it on a robot. This type of sensor would be a great asset to small (and large) mobile robots and it’s a steal for the $399 it costs to buy the Neato robot. He want to kickstart the process of documenting how to use it.
The Open Lidar Project – Hack the Neato XV-11 Lidar – [Link]
This project is a CNC plotter equipped with a 300mW laser able to deliver great results on a variety of materials. The power of the laser is enough to cut thin films and engrave wood. Check construction details on the link below.
CNC Plotter with Burning Laser – [Link]
Owen builds a CNC laser cutter that can cut sheet metal. It’s rated at 250 Watt and costs around 15K $. Check constructions details on the link below. He writes: [via]
This is a CO2 laser system that cuts sheet metal. The laser and all optics are stationary. The beam is directed downwards on to the part that sits on a computer controlled platform which moves the piece in the x and y directions. Cutting is achieved by passing the beam through a focusing lens inside of a cutting head nozzle. Oxygen is fed into the side of the chamber below the focusing lens. This gas exits the nozzle along with the beam and the laser beam/oxygen combination serves to vaporize the steel.
DIY 250-watt laser cutter - [Link]
