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Originally Posted by Earl
Sorry that I can't add any new information to your question, but maybe it IS time to have a separate thread on this, maybe "Laser Cutting for Everyone" or something similar, so that folks that do have working knowledge of these can help the rest of us.
I too would like to learn more and maybe get a laser cutter one day. I think I'd probably do one of those before I did a 3D printer.
Earl
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I agree. A laser cutter has many model rocketry-relevant uses--cutting sheet balsa, sheet basswood, and 0.050" gauge Beveridge board (fiber or fibre) fins, strakes, gussets, centering rings, boost-glider mounting hooks, etc. They could also be used--for large and/or lightweight models, including scale models--for cutting internal frame parts, as well as outer skin panels, for building contoured, semi-monocoque fins (metal aircraft and sounding rocket fins frequently use this lightweight yet strong, frames-backed skin structural method). Also:
For creating smaller models or parts, a laser-guided, "3D cutter/chisel" (with interchangeable blades, depending on the desired use) would be very useful. For example, many kits called/call for sanding in a root-to-tip taper, and a symmetrical airfoil or faceted cross-section, into the fins (or an asymmetrical airfoil, for many boost-glider kits' wings). A 3D cutter/chisel could hold a sheet balsa (or sheet basswood) fin or wing "blank," which could be moved along the blade (*or* the blade could move, instead) in a series of shallow "passes," to give the blank the desired, programmed shape (the blade--or the blank, in its holder--could tilt as needed to create the desired shape), and:
Such a tool would be equally useful to model aviators and model boat & ship builders, including--but by no means limited to--F/F HLG (Free-Flight Hand-Launched Glider) and F/F catapult glider enthusiasts, and it could also make wing, tail assembly, and fuselage parts for larger, built-up models (R/C sailplanes, powered planes, and vessels, C/L and U/C [Control-Line and U-Control] powered planes, etc.), so there would be a sizable market for it. For model rocketeers and model aviators, the software could contain the airfoil ordinates files for many popular symmetrical (for fins and some wings), asymmetrical (for wings), single & double wedge, and circular arc (for scale-section fins and some supersonic & hypersonic wings) fin and wing cross-sections.