Creating Our First Laser Cutting Operation

In this chapter, we will find out how to implement a laser cutting setup and a cutting operation to process one of the nested layouts created in Chapter 12.

The goal of this chapter is to give you a general understanding of the process of laser cutting, highlighting its complexities. In the process, we will also discover how and why cutting tabs should always be added and how to compensate for the cutting width of the laser beam.

In this chapter, we will cover the following topics:

• Using Fusion 360 for laser cutting
• Creating a new setup for laser cutting
• Creating a new cutting tool
• Implementing our first cutting operation

Technical requirements

To follow along with this chapter, make sure that you have read Chapter 11 and Chapter 12, as we are going to resume where we left off.

Using Fusion 360 for laser cutting

This chapter is intended to present all the features and commands that Fusion 360 offers. The goal is to create a cutting toolpath ready to be exported to our cutting machine. I aim for my explanations to be as clear and complete as possible; however, there are a few important limitations related to the subject.

As silly as it may sound, laser cutting is not similar to milling. In milling, there are multiple parameters ruled by simple formulas shared as standard by every milling machine brand. The chances are high that if we take a set of cutting parameters used to mill a part on a first CNC and use them on a different brand machine, they will work just as well. However, laser cutting is totally different. Every machine brand is different from its competitors and the number of variables to take into account is huge.

For a proper laser cutting operation, to list just a few parameters, we need to consider the material type, its thickness, its...

Creating a new setup for laser cutting

At the end of the last chapter, we created a set of nested parts; now, it is time to move on and create a new setup, a fundamental step before any cutting operation.

To create a new setup, we can launch the SETUP command from the FABRICATION tab:

Figure 13.1: The Setup command

Once launched, we can explore the different tabs of the panel that appears.

The Setup tab

Inside the Setup tab, we can find all the options to select the components to be included in the cutting setup and the position of the coordinate system:

Figure 13.2: Setup's Setup tab

The first option to check is Operation Type – up until now, we have worked with Turning and Milling; this time, we shall set it to Cutting. Please note that a cutting setup can be used for laser cutting, plasma cutting, or waterjet; there is no difference for Fusion 360.

In the Work Coordinate System (WCS) subpanel, in...

Creating a new cutting tool

Fusion 360 comes with quite a limited range of laser tools – actually, there is only one at our disposal. As you may guess, such a limited library spells trouble for us since, this time, there aren’t plugins or libraries to use; the fastest way is to duplicate the existing tool and change it to our requirements.

To duplicate a tool inside the library, we can simply right-click on it, copy the tool using the Copy tool option, and then paste it inside the local library:

Figure 13.5: Copy tools

My suggestion is to rename the tool with a name that precisely describes the tool’s intended use; in our example, I will rename it: Fiber 4KW Steel 3mm O2.

In order to edit the copied tool, we simply right-click on it and select Edit tool:

Figure 13.6: Edit tool

When editing the tool, we will focus on two tabs: the Cutter and Cutting data tabs.

The Cutter tab

First, let’...

Implementing our first cutting operation

There is one single cutting command available, called 2D Profile. We can find this in the FABRICATION tab, then inside the CUTTING drop-down menu:

Figure 13.9: The 2D Profile command

Please note that in contrast to milling or turning, laser cutting is just a simple operation (there aren’t complex machining strategies). Let’s review the command together.

The Tool tab

As we have seen, the Tool tab lets us choose the cutting tool and its cutting speed:

Figure 13.10: The 2D Profile Tool tab

First of all, we have to choose the cutting tool for the cutting operation. As we can see from the screenshot, using the Select option, we can pick the laser tool we just created (Fiber 4KW Steel 3mm O2).

Choosing the proper cutting tool is important, but we also have to set the Cutting Feedrate used for the operation. Most of the time, this requires us to manually insert the speed...

Summary

This concludes the chapter and the section on laser-cutting technology. Overall, it has been quite a slim introduction to lasers since there aren’t many options related to laser cutting to play with inside Fusion 360.

However, to recap what we went through here, we first found out why Fusion 360 is not the best solution on the market to implement cutting operations by highlighting most of its weaknesses.

Then we created our first cutting setup using one of the nested layouts we created during Chapter 12. While reviewing the options available for tool creation, we discussed a few important cutting parameters and their underlying importance.

Finally, we implemented the cutting operation itself and discovered the importance of tabs on the parts. Despite not being very detailed, I think this chapter was essential to get closer to the real world and its complexities.

It is now time to move to the next manufacturing technology: 3D printing!