[sudo-discuss] Laser gantry, oh gantry, where art thou drivers?

[Adam Munich]

Hi all,

The full spectrum laser cutter I brought to the hacker pace has been
out of service for some time, after Brendon's attempt to fix its loose
keyswitch ended in board-popping disaster. (Shit happens,  **but
ermehgawd always remove power before fixing circuits guize**)

Anyway, I bought some new stepper motor drivers to replace the burnt
ones on the controller, but unfortunately there seems to be more
wrecked with it than just that simple fix. I'd love to get this thing
working for the community, though, that's a bit hard with no brains
for the machine.

A new board from full spectrum is $1500, but I contacted them with a
"we're a poor hackerspace" card and they'd be willing to replace it
for $250 if I mail in the old controller, which I feel is within
raise-able reach. This would give us full access to their software
suite / print driver, and a reliable machine.

The other option, suggested by rayc is to use an arduino, stepper
controllers and a g-code generating toolchain to run the machine.
While I don't see any reason why that couldn't work, I feel like that
might be a bit awkward for people who wish to use the cutter, and
further makes the guide I wrote kind of useless.
http://hack.rit.edu/tools/full-spectrum-laser-cutter/

As a community, what do y'all believe is best?

Cheers,
-Adam


---
Aperture Systems: Redefining Radiography -  http://aperture.systems/
http://adammunich.com/ - Cell: +1-650-452-0554

Be • knowledgeable •  social • patient • fearless • compassionate •
fun • humble • forgiving.

Be a leader
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