Laser Cutters

This morning I set up to cut the rest of the ribs in 3/32nd balsa.
I checked the positioning by turning the heat down to S100 F900 & it was spot on so I set it away with S500 F800. It was just starting to break through with about half the lines visible on the reverse side so I did the second one at S500 F600. All the lines were visible on the reverse side & daylight could just be seen though them.
The break tabs cut out nicely to release the parts.

While doing that I realised I had forgotton about the cut-outs to pass the leads through for the servo so I drew them in on a separate layer in Librecad, froze the others & exported them as an svg , saved them as a g-code files in LaserGRBL so I could open it in Notebook.
LaserGRBL always positions the cuts at 0,0 so I had to add in a G92 X-4 Y-23 to put them in the right place. I put the cut balsa back at the stops & cut the cut-outs at S500 F500. Without break tabs they dropped out cleanly.
So I think break tabs are advisable, if a part becomes loose & moves under the laser it would be a problem.
The parts could be labelled on a separate layer, as I did the cut-outs, & then engraved on an additional pass using a lower power.
 


 

I've found LaserGRBL easy to use, mind I'm not doing much with it, only loading a file & cutting the parts. I don't know if there's anything else you can do?

I've been opening the SVG file which defines the Feeds & Speed, then saving the G-code file & editing it with notepad to alter the F & S & then loading that to cut with. I've just realised I could probably alter them by reopening the SVG file which is much simpler.