Update: LightBurn is now officially supported! You need LightBurn 2.0 Pro or newer (earlier versions do NOT work) and the device definition from Sculpfun, which you can download here. See also further down in the text.
Sculpfun has added a new laser to its product range. The laser sources remain diodes (10W 450 nm blue and 2W 1064 nm infrared), but the mechanics have been changed to galvo technology. The fact that only small mirrors have to be moved instead of the complete mechanics in a galvo laser means that these devices are orders of magnitude faster than classic diode lasers. The G9 promises speeds of 5000 mm/s, which corresponds to 300,000 mm/min in the classic diode laser measuring mode. However, higher speeds also mean lower energy transfer, so this does not provide an advantage with all materials (cutting is not always faster), see also the explanations on settings. However, you can still have a huge advantage over conventional mechanics when engraving.
The G9 supports both LightBurn and the in-house software SGD Laser Maker. The latter currently offers better support for the G9, LightBurn only works with the new (still beta) version 1.7 and does not yet support all the functions of the G9. I would describe this as an experimental feature at the moment. SGD supports all functions, but is itself still quite new and therefore still contains some bugs and translation errors. I think it will take a few more months before the software support can be described as complete.
Official pictures
Installation and setup
Measured current consumption of the G9:
| Off (power supply plugged in) | 11 W |
| On (standby) | 42 W |
| Blue laser 100% | 93 W |
| Red laser 100% | 77 W |
The following video shows how the laser is set up:
If you want to use a rotary, take a look here:
And, if you use the slide extension, see here:
If you are wondering what the black sheets that are supplied are for, this is calibration paper, which can be used to easily adjust the settings and distortions. The basic procedure is shown here:
Software
The latest version of the software can be downloaded here: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/13lOoC9zgjKCIQHU2PznEgJGnRL66qgmD. A video guide on the basic software functions has been created recently:
I would also recommend renaming the first material in the database to NONE or similar and setting it to 0 or 1% power. SGD constantly loads the first layer for new objects, and this prevents you from destroying your object with the wrong settings (the default is to laser at 60%).
Images with SGD
If you want to laser images with SGD, there are various options that are also familiar from other tools. Among other things, it offers a grayscale and a dithering algorithm. I don’t yet know exactly what the original mode does. Here are just a few words about the most important settings.
The following points are particularly relevant:
- Image Processing
- Original Image – Pass Through-Modus
- Gray – Grayscale algorithm
- Dithering – Dithering algorithm
- Accuracy
- Here you can switch between three quality levels, when I get the actual DPI values I will list them here
- Speed – Depending on the algorithm, there are two options to choose from here
- Grayscale: mm/s. In the grayscale algorithm, the brightness of the pixel is mapped to one of 256 values and the energy is determined from this. So if you have set 50% power, a black pixel is the value 256 and is lasered with 50% of the laser power, a white pixel corresponds to 0 and no pixel is output. Linear interpolation takes place in between.
- Dithering: Dotting time. The dwell time per pixel is specified here. The longer the time spent on a pixel, the more energy the material receives. Therefore, a higher value here means a darker pixel. With dithering, there are no gradations, only 0 or 1. The speed then results from the number of bright pixels per line, and therefore differs between images and individual lines of the image.
LightBurn
LightBurn Pro 2.0 RC-6 is a minimum requirement! The G9 is now officially supported. However, there may still be bugs here and there. I also recommend to install the device driver during the LB installation.
The laser should be configured in LightBurn with the following settings. In addition, here is my device profile, which should contain these settings: Download Device Profile (legacy link, do not use).
Update: Here is the official device profile.
With these settings, the repeat button on the side of the device can be used to start the process, the door sensor works and both lasers (blue/infrared) can be used. The LED bar also works, as does focusing. However, the power input does not seem to work, the laser always lasers with 1% power or similar. Only if you set a higher power with SGD (can be started at the same time) is this also used in LightBurn. This means that it is currently still quite unusable. [Update: The problem should be resolved, it seems to work for me. I will test further].
Addons
I created a jig template that can be used to engrave pens or similar objects. You can download it here: download (LightBurn file) You can extend it easily to create holders for other objects.
Results
Here is a small collection of tests that I have carried out with the G9. You can find many more examples in the official Facebook groups for Sculpfun and the G9.
Maintenance
Here are some videos explaining the process of (dis)assembling the G9:
