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Here's the final chapter on this long, frustrating saga of my Ebay purchase of a multi-line argon laser - A few weeks ago I had won an auction for a multi-line argon (actually I got outbid but I got a second chance offer from the seller, Heuurersciences). Well, when I got that laser, everything that could go wrong did - a non-working fan and a laser that would only idle and not power up all the way.
Then there was my shop-vac cooling attempt, which worked in the short term but sadly I still couldn't get that laser to power up, despite tech support from Chris. So, I had to pack up the whole lot and return it. Well, the fan was bad - totally fried before I had gotten it. The laser, however, was like what happens when your car makes a weird noise and when the mechanic is driving it the noise is never heard! The laser worked for Chris, but not for me :-? I think it might have been that I didn't let it run long enough to fully warm up....was afraid to do that w/o proper cooling.
But anyway, Chris offered me a different argon - this a JDS Uniphase with a control panel on the power supply - and another fan. That arrived a couple days ago, and I set it all up last night - the fan worked well but to my horror the laser wouldn't power up at all! I thought for sure the curse of the non-working multi-line argon had come back again....but then I got an idea to switch out the 110v power cord with an identical one that I borrowed from one of my other lasers. Thankfully all it was was a bad cord and not a bad laser! Chris packs well so I couldn't imagine that it had gotten damaged in shipping.
So all I need is another cord so I don't have to share between two lasers (might want to run them both at the same time, you never know). I took some pictures tonight - not the best quality because I didn't have time to adequately fill my garage with fog.
The control panel (turns out this power setting was too high as it cut out on me after a few minutes!):
The beam:
I swear I feared I'd never get a good working multi-line argon as everything that could go bad on this deal did (though Chris did provide good tech support the whole time)....but I'm overjoyed that I finally have the laser I've been wanting for some time!
Then there was my shop-vac cooling attempt, which worked in the short term but sadly I still couldn't get that laser to power up, despite tech support from Chris. So, I had to pack up the whole lot and return it. Well, the fan was bad - totally fried before I had gotten it. The laser, however, was like what happens when your car makes a weird noise and when the mechanic is driving it the noise is never heard! The laser worked for Chris, but not for me :-? I think it might have been that I didn't let it run long enough to fully warm up....was afraid to do that w/o proper cooling.
But anyway, Chris offered me a different argon - this a JDS Uniphase with a control panel on the power supply - and another fan. That arrived a couple days ago, and I set it all up last night - the fan worked well but to my horror the laser wouldn't power up at all! I thought for sure the curse of the non-working multi-line argon had come back again....but then I got an idea to switch out the 110v power cord with an identical one that I borrowed from one of my other lasers. Thankfully all it was was a bad cord and not a bad laser! Chris packs well so I couldn't imagine that it had gotten damaged in shipping.
So all I need is another cord so I don't have to share between two lasers (might want to run them both at the same time, you never know). I took some pictures tonight - not the best quality because I didn't have time to adequately fill my garage with fog.
The control panel (turns out this power setting was too high as it cut out on me after a few minutes!):
The beam:
I swear I feared I'd never get a good working multi-line argon as everything that could go bad on this deal did (though Chris did provide good tech support the whole time)....but I'm overjoyed that I finally have the laser I've been wanting for some time!
