Laser Cutter Lab

Trainers (Sporadically as requested on MMS email list - while space is open to the general membership)

If your project is going to take more than 1 1/2 hours, you need to reserve the laser cutter. Simply post on the members only board with the date and time as far in advance as you can. If you post less than 24 hours in advance, not everyone may have seen your request, so you might not get the exact time you want. Deal with it.

Only use 1 (one) laser cutter per person. This ensures that people who have quick, 10-minute projects can get in and out regardless of which cutter is available.

Check your optics before you start! If the optics are dirty, you will get a bad cut, but more importantly, dirty optics can cause damage to the machine, and decrease the lifespan of the laser tube.

Clean the optics after you're done. This is being excellent to the next member by cleaning up after yourself.

Do not disable safety interlocks without explicit per-instance approval from laser champion.

If we find that someone hasn't used the air assist on the 60 watt, we will initiate a camera review and consider banning that person for an unspecified length of time…probably measured in months. There have been several situations where we have found the 60 watt unusable until the lens was extensively cleaned. These are expensive and there's no reason we should have to replace them quite so often.

Any print jobs left completely unattended will be immediately stopped. Any member finding a job in progress and unattended is authorized to do this.

If you are making a profit from something at the space (laser cutter or otherwise) the guidelines are that you should be contributing 5% of your profit towards the machines you are using, in order to pay for their upkeep, and wear and tear. This is only fair, you are making a profit, using someone else's machine. If you are not making a profit, but still using the machines to create a product, you should similarly be contributing towards the area funds. Please remember that even if you are running your business on these machines, you have no more right to use the machines than any other member, with the possible exception of the actual owner of the machine.

Finally, remember just how lucky we are to have access to these (very expensive!) machines and be thankful that the 'Space does not charge per minute (like many others) do to defray operating costs.