by macona » Wed Jan 11, 2012 12:39 am
It does not take precision equipment to do this. I use pieces of acrylic as targets and pulse the laser to mark the spot. In the case of the gantry, I take a piece of acrylic in front of the final mirror. Fire the laser with the head at one end, move it to the other and fire again. The should be on the exact same spot. You can also replace the lens with a piece and make sure the beam is coaxial. Just touching the test button very quickly is all you need. You want to mark the plastic, not burn through it.
It takes a while to get a laser in full alignment. It took me probably 2 hours to do the big rabbit we had at techshop. But when I was done It cut very clean and consistent, Alignment has a lot to do with cut quality.