Greg's 2.x Montana Laser Build

[gtcapron]

Hi all,

This is one of my favorite places on all of the web! Thanks to Bart for his passion and commitment and to all the other folks who contribute to the collective working intelligence available here. I have no idea how I will be able to contribute (not sure I have 1/2 the brain power I see here every day ) but I will certainly do my best to find a way!

By way of introduction - I have been lurking on this site for quite a while. Found it while building my 2nd generation CNC router and was lucky enough to have found and got to contribute to the Makerslide Kickstarter project. Also have gotten completely enamored of the challenge and process of figuring out how to build my own stuff. The router, while far from finished (is it ever be done?) is certainly functioning well and I have had a lot of fun exploring the capabilities of such a machine. I still struggle (mostly explaining to other people and my wife ) what I use the thing for, I am hoping that some creative ability can be learned as I find that to be the most difficult part! I am beginning to grow into finding fun and useful things to make instead of the constant upgrade loop of working on the machine. I still continue to work on dust collection (3rd generation) and table hold down (2nd generation) and I have been tempted to use my Makerslide on the router - not sure about this but will continue to explore.

Anyway (sorry for getting windy), I have my order from Misumi and am in the process of ordering several of the kits from Bart. As I have a router, I was tempted to cut the skins myself but AluPanel is hard to come by in rural Montana as are viable alternative materials (I suspect straw, wheat or pine might be too flammable ). Already use Mach 3, so in the beginning will certainly go that way with the choice of final control (LO DSP?) to come as I get further along.

Thanks for the expertise I have already gleened from all of you and as stuff comes up I will do my best to help out!

Greg C