@lasers - Those of you that operate and use the laser cutter need to ensure that the lens is correctly replaced after cleaning and that the screw clamping the lens in place is tightened up.
The pictures below are of the lens INCORRECTLY fitted. The chamfered corners should line up with the chamfered corners of the red housing. You will see that this is NOT the case in the photos.
@techfolderkites this is probably the cause of your problems last night.
Maybe we should put a dab of nail polish on one end of the of the lens to highlight the correct way out?
To be fair the corners are pretty obvious, it never occurred to me that you could even put it in backwards.
Maybe a little Dymo Label on the flat section?
It does seem overkill, given there are very clear visual clues already.
This is the second time this has happened recently, isn’t it? I seem to recall another thread on the same thing.
I agree seems like s training issue but then not everyone is as observant as the next person.
An addition to paperwork near the cheat sheet would help in this case, once you’ve factored in that other distractions while starting out like people can randomly change your saved materials settings, the fact that the software has a slightly different plate measurement to the used plate size 726432, (I had prepared all my files for 730438) serves a reminder that you really may need an hour to prepare for important work while learning, even if you did that exactly the same the day before. Recently learned to save material settings to my USB stick, all part of the learning curve. There are quite a few other distractions that come up, so I think a memo near the cutter would avoid human error here because it’s easy to forget simple things when your mind is on more difficult problems.
USB save sounds very useful.
There was a Monday night laser group that was going to draw up a list of basic settings to use/check. I’ve turned up and found bed size altered, z-offest changed (causing nozzle to crash the bed!), and countless smaller details that you assume to be constants. Would be useful to have that resource.
Yeah, I have to say that when I used it last time the lens was loose. I thought that person that used it before me forgot to tighten it up. That is why is very important to check before and after…
Photographs of correct and incorrect lens placement near the laser cutter might be a good idea.
That was quite possibly me… I have got caught out by the fact it’s the ‘wrong’ way to tighten a couple of times. Sorry!
I’ve made this mistake soooooo many times, haha. I usually give the lens a quick tug to make sure I’ve gotten it right before wandering off 
