Pangolin ScannerMax

[planters]

Bill stated that a typical CN scanner, directly from the manufacturer, costs on the order of $10 and was clear that he was planning to the hit both the performance as well as the price axis at the same time. I don't think it is just wishful thinking that these will be affordable. The general consensus from the audience was that "I can't wait" not "Oh wouldn't it be nice" and Bill encouraged this. But, he did not give any specifics that you could rely on to estimate a price other than their commitment to supply thousands of these with their stockpile of components. They can't be planning to market to only LOBO and at the same time there is no profit competing with CN and so tween EM and CT is a logical guess, but a broad range.

[edison]

I totally agree with Andy. Most people use the word expencive and it gives the impression that is too much for what they get. But when looking at Eyemagics for example its not expencive but just allot of money. If you want something reliable and service then it will cost you. If you can,t afford it now save money now by doing lasershows with DT40,s and buy eyemagics later. My opinion is: want to drive a mercedes? stop wyining and start saving.

[edison]

I totally agree with Andy. Most people use the word expencive and it gives the impression that is too much for what they get. But when looking at Eyemagics for example its not expencive but just allot of money. If you want something reliable and service then it will cost you. If you can,t afford it now save money now by doing lasershows with DT40,s and buy eyemagics later. My opinion is: want to drive a mercedes? stop wyining and start saving.
Also it depends on what level of quality you want or need. If you do lasershows at a schoolparty for 50 euro,s and free drinks stick with something cheap. But if you start thinking doing things professionally you can step in with a lower quality and then upgrade after a while. That is called investing. Most companies do it like this. Hobby and having a company are 2 different things

[mixedgas]

Why am I skeptic? First let me take care of PJ's question:

Once upon a time, a very skilled engineer built a G120 amp with 60 volt rails and some exquisite protection circuitry. That was in the late 90s. ~ 50K with G120s.
Mr Inatsugu has a ILDA Fenning award for such skill.

Rumors of a certain very big show company having water cooled 100K 6800s abounded after a Still Image of a graphic was published on the ILDA magazine's front cover in the late 90s or early 2000s. We were assured the shot was a single scan head. The picture is marvelous, the point count must be huge. It must have been done using cooled galvos, better then average amps, and software optimization. I later bought a used projector made by that company which confirmed much of that. The fan cooled scan head mount pointed to very high speed with high reliability. The amps were not a stock amp, had quite a bit of extra feedback loops and refinements . I had to sell the amps before I could test them. The claim was perhaps best restated at maybe 100K small angle.

That extra cooling reduces the chance of the old coil temperature calculator circuit kicking in at wide angles. Water cooling would have really helped with that. So I now believe the claim really should have been 60-70K scanning with extreme wide angle.

Getting to the teething problems:

The problem with the Asian galvos used to be how the magnet was bonded to the stator. This improvement gets rid of heat. CT has a very nice technique for doing that.

CT has ceramic bearings. How many low cost galvos have ceramic bearings? That is one key to a very long life.

During the cold war, and I'm sure until recently, it was a ITAR violation to sell such bearing manufacturing technology to the Chinese
I'm sure they make them now.
--------------------
Why you buy quality:

If my Eye Magics die, they go for a rebuild and come back with the latest magnet upgrades, actually quite faster. More then one facility can do the repair. It has happened exactly once, when the nickle plating flaked off one of the magnets. I grabbed the spare and swapped it in one minute. I did not have to retune the amp. That was a very early generation Eye Magic, and that plating problem was fixed long ago. I can still send that 5 year old pair in for a repair. They do not have bearings, they have a sintered bronze, self oiling, bushing. Everybody scoffed at that bushing at first. But it is very reliable and the scanners have a beautiful response.

I really doubt I could swap part of a 150$ pair out and get the same level of results without retuning.

Sometimes you need quality over quantity. Touring is one of those places. A Gaga type's manager is not going to like it if her lasers quit.

Unexpected failures show up in first Gen scanners of any brand. This is why I want to really evaluate a greater then 100K pair before I spend the money.

Problems I can remember:



Plating problems occur often on scanner magnets, the first Gen Catweazles absolutely shredded their magnets when the plating cracked.
Mine did, so did every other first gen pair I'm aware of. That got into the jeweled (Ruby) bearing and the shaft was torn up.

If its not plating problems, its bearing problems.

Case one, Early death of the then brand new CT6800s with plain bearings. Hence the 6800HP with ceramic.

Case two:

My first and last set of DTs have the wrong lubricant in the bearings. It gets stiff over time.
I had to work them loose with pliars when they sat on the shelf. Finally the bearing froze and the scanner is toast. The scanner is on my bench at home.

One company found out the hard way that some dielectric mirrors leak red as the angle changes. Being a good company, they replaced quite a few mirrors for free.

-----------------------
Let me explain the possible claim of the 100K G124. This comes in two parts.

The G124 is not the fastest open loop at 1200 Hz resonance. The G603 family was faster, at ~2400 Hz first resonance, but the angle is very small, so demand was low, and sales were poor. I had a dead 6xx, once. You would not believe who offered to buy it, but you could possibly guess. Fastest I've seen out of a G124 is ~14K with special tweeked amps. So how did they come up with that number? See below.

In the G124's defense. You can drive the snot out of a G124, and they are far tougher then a G120. The longer torsion bar is magical. I still have a pile of G124s, with the Accel 124 Amps, and they are not going anywhere. Because if I need a good pair of scanners in 2040, they will still be working. I will still find the needed op-amps and Darlington transistors on whatever is the Ebay of the day.

You get what you pay for, unless there is a major shift in the technology paradox.

Sometimes the claim is marketing speak:

12K x 12K x 12K x 12K x 12K = Greater then 250,000K Scanning. That was one Geman claim that it took us a while to figure out. X * Y * R * G * B with G120 galvo color = ~ 250K PPS, if you count RGB and both scanners in the equation.

I agree with Andy!

"Mercedes A Number 1" Quote from the movie The Killing Fields

So show me the numbers, and state the scan angle please.

Steve

[White-Light]

I strongly suspect, with no inside info, that Pangolin scanners will come in at or just below CT's in price especially if the performance rumours prove true.

As for Pangolin's claims, remember Bill Benner was a design consultant during the design of 60K CT's: http://www.pangolin.com/laserists%20...eakthrough.pdf

I'd also be very surprised if the angle was ridiculously small given the conversation about Eye Magic and 60K scanning a while ago.

The proof of the pudding is going to be in the eating of course. However, given the kitchen its coming out, the speciality chef and the quality of materials already mentioned in the other thread before, I'd be very surprised if it was spotted dick instead of millionaire's pudding!

[masterpj]

Pj, for your info; There are quite a few guys with CT and GS scanners who have been running much higher speeds for many years. Lobo in germany have the fastest scanners I saw to date, I saw them live and those were if I remember General scanning G124s running much faster than any of my CT6210HPs, and was about 7 years ago.

All our scanners seam to be capable to go much faster if using the right drivers.

I buy CT or Eye magic, because these are field proven for at least 10 years.

Let's see some proof, photos or any other evidence of these new space age things that were impossible for anyone else to make.

Pj, this thread smells of marketing spam, maybe it was better to put it in the general info threads.

Andy I've seen those Lobo scanners actually at prolight and sound.
Yes they are capable of incredibly high speeds, but I also heard their livespan is really short and their price is immense (Just like 99% of lobo's pricing).

[JRGixxerfreaK1]

Just a little update that I see so far




Cheers!

[ImageLight]

Wow, Let there be beams and plenty of them.. Congrats and Best Wishes on the Saturn 5 launch pad...

Mark

[White-Light]

Looking good so far. Unusual block shape.

I wonder aesthetically if the top of the block should have the edges chamfered to match the sides or maybe curves all round?

[Insanity]

Looking good so far. Unusual block shape.

I wonder aesthetically if the top of the block should have the edges chamfered to match the sides or maybe curves all round?

Unusual????? Have you never seen CT6215's?????