One edge of the part (in this image, the bottom) is about square with the surface, while the other side is very angled. For the orientation in this image, the laser would have been to the right of the piece, firing left. A symmetric angled cut wouldn’t be a problem, but the asymmetry causes the axle that I am press-fitting into the part to come out angled as well. Is this an expected artifact of this laser cutter or lasers in general?
I saw you and Danny chatting after you’d posted this, so I assume you already got an answer in person lol. Just in case though-
Yeah, the lasers are an “hourglass” shape when firing. This can lead to the uneven cutting visible in your photo. You shouldn’t have a ton of difference when cutting 1/4” though.
Bad focus (usually due to warping material, not actually a bad focus on behalf of the user), settings, or material can make the problem worse though. I’ll try to catch you in person next time to try and talk through some of it!
Makes sense! That could definitely be part of it, but it also seems like either the bed or the cutting head is tilted slightly. I got the same asymmetry consistently in both the center and back-left corner of the bed, where the side closer to the front of the machine was much more angled than the side closer to the back. I would expect an aligned hourglass to produce the same angle on both sides.
Out of curiosity, does the focus tool put the center of the hourglass at the surface or slightly below it? Would there ever be a reason to offset the focus to get it exactly in the center of the material, or do the benefits of cutting through the surface layer quickly outweigh that?
