Bummer. I’m just fearful of ordering anything from China with all the shipping issues right now…
I’ve been ordering odds and ends and I haven’t had any trouble, despite the recent complaints. China is a big place, maybe the problems aren’t evenly distributed? Or maybe the small stuff is easier to get than a container full of hot pants?
You’re in the market for hot pants??? 
Not anymore. 
I vaguely remember a simpsons episode where a container of hot pants washed up on shore. There was some movie with Robert Redford where he was in a sail boat that was sunken by a container, and I thought that was some kind of shorts too. Somewhere in my brain, I have it in my mind that the container ships often have single containers with nothing but hot pants in them. Somehow, that got through the filter…
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I think the container in “All Is Lost” was sneakers.
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I really appreciate you guys filling me in on where the holes in my “education” are. The Simpsons pretty much came and went without me ever taking much notice. Obviously deprived, I am found sadly lacking…
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Or untainted by the silliness.
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Playing a bit with my fun new toy…
Cut a second “heart-tree” (150mm/min at 100% power, ~35 minutes, one pass, air-assist) because the first revealed a bad spot on the 3mm plywood sheet…
Lifted the sheet off the machine and the figure dropped free of the sheet…
Remaining bits fell out easily by themselves… leaving a nice delicate figure intact
The first tree has a few bits that didn’t cut through because of the bad spot in the plywood sheet and can’t be removed without breaking fragile limbs…
Still impressed!
– David
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Getting ready for the prom… who knows? Might find that special lady friend to frolic with… and need a bowtie 
Oops, first cut okay but air-assist line kinked toward one end… turned sheet to try again…
Neje A40640 dual-diode laser module (~15W), 3mm birch ply, about 40 minutes per bowtie at 200 mm/min feed, 100% power…
Current state of FoamRipper machine with new Z-axis and laser module…
– David
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Looks great! Is that just readily available birch plywood? I notice a few company’s laser cut what looks like birch but seems to have a very thick single core
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Thanks! I ordered this 3mm/1/8" x 12" x 24" plywood off Amazon last year IIRC. I’ve found a couple of difficult to laser-cut spots on the couple of sheets I’ve worked with so far but they were fairly small and the rest of the sheet cut nicely.
More adventures in air-assist… and variations on a theme…
While reworking a different laser machine, I revisited a previous air-assist configuration from the past – an air-mattress pump and router speed control for regulating air flow…
but I noticed that with my last air-assist setup using 4mm/6mm (ID/OD) tubing and ball-valve, the air flow from the mattress air-pump seemed too greatly restricted. So I reworked the printed air-assist nozzle to accept larger 3/8"OD and 1/4"ID vinyl tubing from big-box store…
Clear vinyl tubing installed on Neje A40640 laser module…
resulted in unexpected light show
3mm birch ply cut at 150mm/min and 100% power, in a single pass, falls through…
blackened, though not charred, edges and holes…
a cross-stitch pendant blank, waiting for my daughter’s inspection and approval…
AFAICT the air-pump and larger tubing are equal to or better than the aquarium compressor and smaller tubing as far as air-assist goes. Whether or not the air-pump holds up to the unconventional use with router speed control and restricted air-flow remains to be seen.
It’s fun to play with though…
– David
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Nice. I need that larger tubing part. I’m having to use a metal tube to go from the larger tubing size coming from my compressor to the smaller one on the current part.
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David,
I think I’ve added it to my air-assist “thing” earlier today but for some reason that “thing” has never given me the option to make it “public”… 
If you can’t find it out there, here it is…
Neje40WNozzle-r3.zip (469.2 KB)
– David
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Dang it. That one’s too big.
Neither one seems to fit the aquarium air line tubing I have.
It’s ok. I have the first version working with the adapter I made.
Thanks for the part designs.
David,
That new nozzle design accepts 3/8" (9.5mm) OD x 1/4" (6.35mm) ID vinyl tubing I got at Lowes just a couple of days ago. In fact I bought several sizes down to 1/4"OD as well… just in case. I don’t remember where you are but being inexpensive and readily available here, I can’t imagine any big-box store near you not having something suitable in stock.
What tubing do you have? If you can provide the OD, I should be able to adjust my CAD model and give you an STL pretty quickly.
– David
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Oh. I know I can go get some. I just already have a bunch of air line tubing from petco.
I’ll have to grab the OD tomorrow.
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Ok. Ran outside this morning. Funny enough, the tubing still has the tag on it. Looks like I’m using 1/4" OD tubing.
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Funny enough, I have a 20’ coil of the same stuff… one of the smaller coils I picked up on my last Lowes run. However, somebody doesn’t know their conversion, imperial to metric, on your label… 1/4" isn’t 8mm, but 6.35mm. So I measured mine and it is indeed closer to 6.35mm… I’ll use 6.5mm for the nozzle. I’ll also include one for 8mm just in case…
Here they are…
Neje40WNozzles.zip (964.1 KB)
It’s an easy thing to adjust for a different size tubing… just let me know
– David
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