I and my team on Facebook, have discovered a factory defect in the glowforge power supply that effectively kills a glowforge in 2 years (great for profit) the name of the file is usually where the defect was found from tip:
Here are images of the defect
More when I am allowed.
Jonathan
Mine is 5 years old. Different power supply or is 2yrs just a guess?
My amateur detective work, shows the older the glowforge, the better it was made.
the original basics has two intake fans, Hard plastic wheels, Better quality work
the newer the glowforge the more flimsy its been finding a single cooling fan in a pro
and other random factors. also I think the refub they use are repurposed defective returns
slapped repaired, or not repaired at all, just a quick cleaning and re released into the wild.
JMHO
This looks to be more of a defect in the insulation of the HV wire. Once that is breached, intermittent shorts to ground would likely kill the power supply.
Does it look like the HV wire is rubbing against something?
I think it is likely that the power supply has not changed since the original. It was designed by a reputable power supply company and so far proven to be decently capable and reliable.
Im experimenting with repairing the defect and then adding a sleeve to guarantee no repeat performance.
Jonathan
It’s definitely an insulation issue and how they feed it through the machine. It doesn’t hurt the power supply (most of the time) because a laser tube is just a giant short circuit anyhow. Jonathan’s team has repaired the bad insulation on numerous machines and the power supplies still work perfectly. Shorting the secondary on a flyback transformer does no harm to the PS, but it does make the machine not work while it’s shorted.
Hello. I have been reading your threads. And wanted to ask if the newer machines still have this problem?
3 days ago my 3 year old pro stop cutting. It makes the movement like usual and doesn’t fire laser.
After speaking to glowforge 2 hours and being offered 40% off new machine. I was recommended to watch some videos about the red high voltage wire and how to check for damage. I just did the steps/ adding the string/ however my machine had a black protection sleeve already installed. I still removed it up until the tracklike section on left of machine. And to my naked eye the red wire doesn’t look damaged. I’m not sure if I purchase the “wire replacement kit” if this will fix my problem ? How could I know if the burn or damage is under the machine or worse inside the power supply? I purchased in 2022.
Any help is appreciated. Thank you JP
