Options and pricing on fiber laser? How about just the laser head?

Our waterjets are just outside their useful range with some work we have and need to consider a new or used laser. Seems fiber is the way to go today. We need to cut mild steel, stainless, and Aluminum. We also have some plastics to run.

I was looking at the Amada with a 3kw laser. I am usually reluctant to make calls because they will then put us on the "call list" to bug us. I just want to know the range of price for a laser? New, used?


Also, we have both a jet and router that could be retrofitted if we can get just the laser? I know we will need to look at this option carefully because a jet probably won't have optimal contouring speed and the router has a moving table, in which was not designed to move steel plates around.

^ Honestly whilst you may be able to get a head only, i really advise against it, the water jet will be too slow and same for the router, you need accurate motion at 11+meters a minute. Also acceleration and de acceleration matter greatly and you effectifly have to come on and off the laser power as you enter and exit corners, hence its realy not like say a oxy act torch head which probaly would be a easy bolt onto your water jet.

Water jet wise i dont think the enviroment would play well with a laser either.

Buy a whole package that has single source responsibility. If retrofitting, a plasma cutter would be a better host. Most any laser does not get programmed in Z as a machine number. The Z is height of the nozzle from the surface like a good plasma cutter. Head goes down to programmed height off the surface, height control senses the surface. Lift the sheet slightly when cutting and head keeps its distance. But what about Diamond Plate? Yup, head follows the diamond pattern up and down.
Not possible to do the router and WJ would have vaporized metal spraying into the basin. The fiber head requires the metal fiber cable, cooling water for the head, oxy and Nitrogen assist gasses along with controls for either.

I would not touch a laser unless buying the whole machine. It isn't like a waterjet or plasma. You need to consider the safeties, both operator safeties and cutting head safeties. I don't know how many times we crashed our Cincinnati that had a break-away head and never hurt it. Probably a few hundred times that thing got ripped off with no issues. My laser cut shop now got a brand new Mitsubishi and in the first week ripped the head off, and it was not a breakaway style. They've been down a few weeks and out a few thousand bucks.

I don't know what a new laser costs. I think a Salvagnini L3 is in the $200k range? We ordered ours with a robotic material tower and had dealings with several other machines and our number for everything was higher but I think the machine itself was in that 200 range. That's the top-tier vendor though, and is not their top-tier machine. We had their L5 and I still don't think there's anything from any other company that touches that for speed. Cutting stainless, reliably, at 1200-1400ipm is an amazing sight to see.

I am guessing, but i believe you are going to be looking in the 500k+ range for the Amada laser could be a little less for the 3k but i dont see it being much less. Your bigger name brands will be around that same price and up. HK makes a Falcon that is supposedly priced pretty well. Believe its around 2.5k cutting output. I have a good working relationship with the sales guys I can ask him a rough price for that machine if you want. That way you wont get bugged over it. Just let me know. I had 1 c02 then upgraded to a hk 4k fiber. Been a great machine for us.

yeah, I would be curious. We need to look and compare our options. Most what the laser can and cannot do, and where the jets need to be used.

At 3Kw laser would top out around 20mm mild steel, 10mm stainless and probaly about 8mm alu, you may get a little more or less, all depends on your desired cut quality. Expect over 5m a minute cut speeds on any sub 1/8" stuff, about half that at 1/4" in steel at a rough guess.

Pierce wise expect sub 5 seconds and sub 1 second on 1/8" or under, also unlike a jet, pierce does not overly bother the laser and does not effect nozzle life anything like the same + laser nozzles are cheap as chips compared to plasma or water jet consumables.

I will add though there's a lot more competition in the laser market, so if your just a profile supplier expect a fair bit more competition than on the jet only work im oftern buying parts over here with more than 3 laser cut holes in the sub 20 pence range in the mid hundred quantities. on smaller parts the handleing of cut parts can be more than one person can keep up with. So factor that in too. Its rare that a sheet on a laser will have more than low double digits of cut time, so material handling needs to be good fast and efficient.

huleo said:

yeah, I would be curious. We need to look and compare our options. Most what the laser can and cannot do, and where the jets need to be used.

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Waterjets are more versatile. They can cut thicker reliably, and can cut non-ferrous with no issues if material is rigid. They leave no heat affected zone.

Lasers are much much faster and potentially much cheaper to operate. Just give them gas and power. You can score plastic protective wrap and cut, and potentially do some engraving (though cutting lasers almost as a rule are not appropriate for good quality engraving).

I like lasers, we ran an enormous amount of material through one fast L5 and one slow CL-707. I don't know what the $ entry threshold would be as I wasn't cutting the checks.

In a 3kw-4kw fibre most our quotes were in the $450-600k USD range from the popular known brands (Mitsubishi, Amada, Trumpf, Mazak, etc).

The Trumpf lasers are made in Ct, next state over from me. I got to tour that plant when I was in the buying process of my press brake. If I remember correctly they complete one of those lasers every day. A lot of big machine tools in that plant and all made in Germany with names I did not recognize.
The models I saw being made were completely self contained including the dust/fume collection system. All within a single giant shoe box shaped unit. I watch a worker take one of those across the plant to the loading area by overhead crane. He had it about 6 feet off the floor and was just walking along with his had on it to keep if from twisting.