Hi Kevin,
I'm not that familar with RTC4 but I'll try to answer your questions here (and
do some more investigation with our RTC specialists).
The stand by parameters are used for CO2 and Laser Mode 4 (which is some
YAG/Fiber laser mode). That's why we use it as general parameter and don't have
it assigned to CO2 only. For several YAG-types this is useless. These
frequencies are emitted at LASER1 output.
The Q-Switch frequency is controlled by the "Frequency" parameter in pen
settings and is emitted at LASER1 output too. So when changing the pen
frequency you should see a change in frequency/pulse width at LASER1. If that
does not work for you, please send me an example project so that we can try to
reproduce the problem here using your settings.
Regarding the power: yes, you are right, this is used only when you have wired
your laser for being controlled by the scanner card.
Kind regards
Jim
On 04 February 2013 at 12:11 Kevin Criqui <kcriqui(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
I've spent some time trying to figure out the configuration of
BeamConstruct to suit my YAG laser. My laser has built-in first pulse
suppression so I run it in YAG mode 1 with LASERON wired to the 'gate'
input and LASER1 wired to the q-switch trigger input. Power is adjusted
by changing the q-switch pulse rate and / or by RS-232 commands to
control the pump diode current.
I'm have some questions:
- in RTC Definition, there are 2 parameters which I'm not clear on,
Stand By Frequency and Stand By Length. Best I can tell, these are only
used in CO2 mode. Can you tell me if they have any affect in YAG mode?
- in Pen Settings:General
- Power is only used for lasers where power is controlled by the RTC
output defined in RTD Definitions 'Power Output' (such as lamp pumped
YAG lasers with an analog power control signal)
- Frequency - not sure what this does. It does not seem to affect
the q-switch rate
- Pen Settings:Laser
- Pulse Length -> Q-switch Pulse Width
- First Pulse -> FirstPulseKiller Length
- Half Period - This does not seem to affect the q-switch pulse
rate. I think it may only apply to CO2 mode?
- Stand-By Pulse Width - also seems to be CO2 specific
- Stand-By Frequency - CO2 specific?
My biggest question right now is which setting actually controls the
q-switch pulse rate (on the LASER1 pin of the RTC card). The
performance of my laser varies dramatically with pulse rate so I need to
set it for each different material I work on. I think it should be the
'half period' setting, but I have not seen any change in performance
with this set to widely different values.
Kevin
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Kind regards
Jim Hart
http://www.lasermarkingsoftware.com
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