SoliForum - 3D Printing Community — Filawinder laser sensor light question

Re: Filawinder laser sensor light question

2016-11-14T17:54:14Z

An LED would probably work. The calibration step is able to deal with whatever the conditions are. It might be more susceptible to changes in ambient lighting however. The idea of using the laser was to saturate the sensors to the point that changes in ambient would be mostly drowned out.

Re: Filawinder laser sensor light question

2016-11-14T16:55:13Z

notstarman wrote:

You can operate it with out the laser line diode. Its used to provide an even light source. I would suggest finding a lamp or flash light and using it to illuminate the sencor. As long as the filament cast a shadow on to the photoresistors it should work. So no need to wait on the part.

Thanks for the suggestion. I don't know how the arduino is programmed to interpret the data received from the sensor, in regards of light intensity, light spectrum, excess of light, etc... So I wanted to stick to the defaults used by Ian when designing the machine, but any alternatives are welcome while I wait to receive the lens.

I actually tried to make my own lens but did not have any luck finding a replacement material I could use to focus the light on a single strip/line.

Re: Filawinder laser sensor light question

2016-11-13T09:16:19Z

You can operate it with out the laser line diode. Its used to provide an even light source. I would suggest finding a lamp or flash light and using it to illuminate the sencor. As long as the filament cast a shadow on to the photoresistors it should work. So no need to wait on the part.

Re: Filawinder laser sensor light question

2016-11-10T23:27:01Z

That's dissapointing... First, my filawinder had 2 duplicate laser cut parts and another one was missing (which I reported to Tim on Nov 5th by email), and now it turns out another part is missing
I live in Costa Rica, which means it will take 2 weeks for me to get the laser lens, plus $7 of import taxes and shipping.

Re: Filawinder laser sensor light question

2016-11-10T17:08:21Z

Your laser is missing the lens that turns the point into a line. Let Tim know through the Filastruder contact form that you need a new one.

Filawinder laser sensor light question

2016-11-10T16:39:44Z

Hello Everyone
I purchased a filawinder and finished assembling it yesterday. I managed to calibrate the automatic winding feature but it was not working very accurately (sometimes the filament would go through the laser beam without being detected). After inspecting what could have gone wrong, I noticed that the laser beam projected by my laser diode is nowhere similar to the one advertised in the filawinder videos.

In the videos/thingiverse, the laser beam appears to be a vertical line of light that illuminates all the photosensors, like this:

However, my laser's beam of light irradiates light to a single point, and only illuminates 1~2 of the photodiodes in the PCB, like this:

Any ideas?