OMTechK40+ CO2 Laser Engraver, 200x300mm 40W Desktop Laser Engraving Machine for Home Use, LightBurn Compatible 8"x12" Laser Engraver Cutter with Adjustable Laser Head Air Assist for Wood Glass More

found this really hard to get on with as the program was really difficult to use them downloaded light burn, that’s another thing you have. to pay for. moved the laser and found it really hard to re set up looked on line for help useless so sent it back such a shame as it’s a really nice looking piece of kit very big so make sure you have enough room for it hope this helps

This is my first CO2 laser etcher, I've upgraded from a diode laser as I wanted to do more challenging projects on more materials. It's at the lower end of the CO2 laser range, well the lowest actually, I paid £521 whereas many CO2 laser systems are in the thousands, so I need to put this machine in perspective. The machine was well packed and required no assembly at all other than connecting the rear vent pipe. It requires water cooling which wasn't too much trouble to get going, I just bought a 50L drum of distilled water, cut a hole in the top and dropped the water pump into that. The machine is well made and with the extract fan to take away the smoke and air assist it really is a step up from my old diode laser. I'm still trialling different materials so haven't started any proper projects yet, but like when I first had my diode laser I will no doubt spend a few weeks figuring out the settings. So far so good. I do have a few criticisms though - stupid things that should really have been thought through by the manufacturer, none of them are game changers but you don't really need them when you are figuring out how to use a new machine:1. The manual contradicts itself on what you should set the laser currency to - basically how powerful the laser operates at. In one part it says it should be set to 100% and then later it says it shouldn't exceed 70% to maximise the life of the laser... which one is it? A stupid mistake in the manual. After watching a few YouTube videos I went for the 70% setting, basically the maximum power the laser currency read out shows is 17mA.2. This is really dumb. It's very nice that the unit comes with a honeycomb bed to put your workpiece on but it's too low. I will be spending most of my time working on materials with a thickness of 1-6mm, but if you put a say a 3mm workpiece on the bed the laser lens can't focus on it as it's too far away. Even if you extend the lens down as far as it will go it's still no where near focusing on the workpiece. After a bit of effort I manage to get the honeycomb bed out the machine, first of all I thought there was no way it was going to come out, but with a bit of manipulation it did. Fortunately I had some plastic spacers and put an 11mm thickness spacer in each corner of the underside of the honeycomb bed, put the bed back in the machine and pressed it down to seat it. All good, so the bed is now raised up 11mm from where it was and I can properly focus on my workpieces.3. The workpiece is nicely set inside the machine with a viewing window in the main door. It's not that clear to see through the window particularly when you're framing the workpiece but I can live with that. So you run your job and you're eager to see the result, you open the door which sets the door trigger opening contact off and the machine goes into "red" standby mode which you can cancel by pressing the reset button. This is a safety feature to stop the laser in the event you open the door mid-firing... well I get that but it will still go into panic mode even though the job is complete which means you have to keep pressing the reset button every time the door is opened. On my system (Windows PC using Lightburn) it also causes the software to report an error in the console screen of Lightburn even though the job has been complete and the only way to get back to starting a new job is to press the reset button on the machine and send the laser back to Home from Lightburn. Sure, bring everything to a halt when you open the door mid-lasering but it's annoying to do it when the job has been completed and you're just rearranging or changing workpieces and the laser isn't firing. Between you and me I can see a few bits of duct tape being used on the door contacts.So, yes apart from those annoying things, this looks like a great machine and a great price compared to the thousands I could have spent. It's going to take some time to get the hang of things but being able to cut and etch acrylic and clear acrylic is something I'm very much looking forward to doing.