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7.
A circular black mark with diffuse edges should appear on the thermal paper. If there
is interference, the mark will be occluded and/or have a very sharp edge. If this is the
case, your tube is working but has come out of alignment.
You should hear a ‘click’ and/or see a plasma arc inside the tube (may require more than one
button press). The click is from the power supply switching rapidly on then off for the test
pulse. If you observe either of these actions but no mark on the thermal paper, the paper was
most likely reversed or incorrectly placed. If you do not mark the paper and are not observing
a noise during a test fire attempt, it is possible that the cover interlock was not properly
engaged; try shifting the cover or magnet closer to the sensor. If these solutions do not solve
the problem, please contact technical support at
Mirror Alignment
Your laser was aligned during assembly and test in Las Vegas—the CO
2
beam and Alignment
Laser beams were matched to follow the same path through the mirrors and fire down the
center of the focusing head. However, shipping is a high-vibration environment and it is
sometimes necessary to re-align mirrors. Before going through a full re-alignment process,
check and see what the current alignment is:
Alignment Test
1.
Take a piece of thermal paper and place it in front of mirror 3, covering the aperture.
Tape two edges so that the paper will stay relatively taut over the hole. Press your
finger firmly along the edge of the aperture to make a mark on the thermal paper to
show the aperture’s outline.
2.
Jog the laser to the upper left corner.
3.
Close the lid and test fire.
4.
Observe the location of the mark on the thermal paper.
5.
Jog the gantry halfway along the Y axis towards the lower (front) left corner. Test fire
and observe the mark
6.
Jog the gantry the remainder of the way along the Y axis and test fire at the lower left
corner and observe.
7.
The burn mark should be relatively close to the center and should not “walk” after
jogging the laser head.
If there was a great deal of variation in the location of the burn marks (more than 2mm of
drift) you will need to align your laser. We recommend first aligning the invisible cutting beam
with the visible Alignment Beam—this saves a great deal of time lost in opening and closing
the lid for safe access while firing the laser. The procedure for this is the following:
