shop-vac cooling argon laser?

[Schrecken_Licht]

OK, long story here - bought a multi-line argon off Ebay, have had a couple of problems (which I am in the process of working out with the seller) including a cooling fan that does not seem to want to work. However, I still wanted to fire up the laser to see that it worked OK (that's when another issue cropped up but that's being resolved as well - waiting for a response from the seller) but of course I needed something to cool it with.

So I got some duct tape, a butter dish and a 5 gallon shop vac and rigged this up:

My question is, is it safe (safe for the laser - my hearing is another issue, but ear plugs are cheap, and of course I have to plug the laser and vac into different circuits) to use this as make-shift cooling until I get the fan issue worked out?

 

[MarioMaster]

your setup will be ok to test the laser, but i wouldn't run it over 30 seconds to a minute - the velocity of the air in the vacuum is high but the overall CFM may not be that impressive

but heck you could test it enough to see if it outputs anything with no cooling at all since the heatsinks have a large thermal mass (but this method should be limited to like 20 seconds or so)


got any pics of the fan you're having issues with?

 

[Schrecken_Licht]

I haven't run it for more than a minute - I'd be afraid to... I have asked the seller about the fan, though I can post a pic here tomorrow. Either it doesn't work or I've got something goofed up....

 

[Hemlock_Mike]

The fans on my ArIon's are 26 and 35 watts.  That's all - noisy but still just a fan.   I would think that a 1 HP shop vac will suck heat quite well !!
Nice idea but really noisy...

Mike

 

[GooeyGus]

So whats up with the output when you turn it on?

Also, have you opened the head up yet? The fan should lead to a connector in there, maybe check to see if the connection is good, and check for voltage. If theres no voltage, then find where that wire leads and check for voltage/connection etc. I think the fan on mine is just a straight 120VAC fan ( cant remember where I read that... maybe sams faq), so the power comes from one of the bigger pins on the power supply. Or if you can find any info on the fan itself, if it is indeed a 120vac fan, you could just put a plug on the wires and plug it in separately.

 

[Schrecken_Licht]

Actually this fan is an add-on (provided by the seller) - it does not appear that the laser ever had an internally-wired fan. As you can see the fan is 12 volt 2.3 amps, I didn't have any sort of DC converter around that would power it up so I bought what I thought would work - a 12v 3.3a converter. But no luck. I'm really getting P.O.'d about this whole thing.....

As for the output, supposedly some "jumper" fell off the power supply during shipping and the seller is supposed to tell me what I must do to get the output at full power. For now it will only idle.

 

[heruursciences]

This fan may have a remote turn on lead, yellow. If it does ground it and the fan should turn on. Jumper pins 12 and 13 or 13 and 14.

 

[GooeyGus]

if you jump  pins 12&13 it should enable the power knob on the power supply so you can crank up the juice. But in order to really get Full power you need to wire it up for current mode. I can post those instructions too if you'd like.

 

[Hemlock_Mike]

Back to fans for a moment --- Someone warned me about too much cooling for an ArIon. ---- Is too much cooling bad?? I would think that shop vac would pull heat from a raging fire !!

Mike

 

[MarioMaster]

i don't think the shop vac would give too much cooling, in fact i think it would give too little - the velocity is high but the CFM is not super impressive

 

[Schrecken_Licht]

Well, this long sad story (the shop vac is now a moot point) continues on.....I have tried everything the seller has recommended to get the laser working properly and apparently something is mis-aligned in the laser head. :-[

I packed up the laser and sent it back today - hopefully I will be able to get a replacement multi-line argon similar to this one - but one that survives the handling of the postal service and works!

 

[brtaman]

Sorry to hear that Schrecken, I was going to suggest a temp fix of salvaging an old AC-DC (great band!) adapter and just connecting it to the fan, ive done it on a few projects, always worked well for me, in the fact my porta-labby uses an old stripped out nokia adapter to power the fan (heh was too lazy for anything else), just a thought.


Good luck with your argon hope it works great when you get it back


brtaman

 

[heruursciences]

I sold him this laser unit, and think the alignment screws on the tube came loose in shipping, since it will only lase weakly at the high power setting. Lasos tubes have VERY sensitive HR end alignment mechanics. As for the fan I am unsure why it's not working. Murphy's law i guess.

Anyway he's sending it back for realignment and i will try to perm-align the laser tube or replace it with a much better head made by Uniphase.

 

[Hemlock_Mike]

I have purchased many products from Chris at Heruur...... and always been pleased with my product.

Mike

Chris -- you gotta shorten that name

 

[daguin]

Lasos tubes have VERY sensitive HR end alignment mechanics.

[whine] Stop scaring me [/whine]

I don't have my power source yet.

Peace,
dave

 

[Schrecken_Licht]

Sorry to hear that Schrecken, I was going to suggest a temp fix of salvaging an old AC-DC (great band!) adapter and just connecting it to the fan, ive done it on a few projects, always worked well for me, in the fact my porta-labby uses an old stripped out nokia adapter to power the fan (heh was too lazy for anything else), just a thought.


Good luck with your argon hope it works great when you get it back


brtaman

I actually did that with the fan - in fact I tried several DC adapters - including one rated at the exact voltage/amperage as the fan.... : - I don't give up easily....I didn't want to have to send all this back - was hoping the problem could be solved somehow...oh well.