Scrollable Laser Cutting Addition

This Instructable will walk your through the steps of creating a scrollable paper platform to use in a laser cutter. This allows you to cut a continuous pattern in a long strip of paper that could not be done given the standard area of a laser cutter. This project will provide a continuously scrolling paper spool that you can make multiple cuts on in a quick amount of time.

While this platform does not provide an automatic way to scroll the paper it is the first step in making a usable, continuously scrolling paper design in a laser cutter.

Designed and built by:
Russell Winkler
Mossaab Bagdouri
Susan Hendrix
Michael Coury

CU Boulder, Things That Think, Spring 2011

Step 1: Parts and Materials

Arduino Uno
To build some logic and control the behaviours, Arduino Uno was used. The Arduino Uno has built in support for two servos but more can be added if the servo inputs are spliced and placed into the correct pins on the Arduino board. A better description and documentation on the Arduino Uno can be found here http://arduino.cc/en/Main/arduinoBoardUno.

Laser Cutter
The laser cutter that we used for this project was the VersaLaser 1100 along with the drivers and software that come with the laser cutter. Adobe Illustrator was used to produce the template for the cutting surface. The laser cutter that you use to develop this prototype might differ and will affect the size of the platform, the template that you build to the cutting area, and many other considerations for the project.

Wood (Platform and Supports)
Our platform and supports are built out of wood but acrylic could be used too. The size of the platform is specific to the size of the laser cutter that we used. The supports are also sized according to the receipt paper that we used.

Receipt Paper
This is a simple receipt paper picked up from any home office supply company. If you want to use a different type of paper for the project make sure the supports for the platform are changed accordingly along with the servo dowel.

Dowel
A properly sized dowel is required to be placed on the end of the servo to pull in the receipt paper.

Momentary Switch
This is basically a button that triggers the programmed movements. A touch sensor could also be used in place of a switch.

Resistor (10k Ohm )
Only one resistor is required for this project. This resistor is necessary to control the behaviour of the electric circuit. The exact placement for these resistors will be explained further in the Instructable.

360 Degree Servo
A continuously rotating servo is required in this project to roll up the receipt paper. The servo we used was purchased from Sparkfun and is available here. http://www.sparkfun.com/products/10189

Ladyada Motor Shield
Arduino on its own cannot power itself or the servos without a USB connection or A/C Adapter. To create a more portable automaton we built a Motor Shield as described in http://www.ladyada.net/make/mshield/make.html and we connected it to the Arduino. We then connected an independent power supply and the servos to the Motor Shield.

Battery Pack
During the development phase, the power was supplied through a USB cable connected to a computer. In the production phase, we used a pack of 4 AA batteries. 

Comments

[John Nelson]

A smaller timing or registration hole along one side with an optodetector-counter similar to a paper tape reader would be a good solution. No stepper or servo needed. Just pull the tape until the next hole is sensed.

[phar]

if i might suggest, using an optical encoder like a mouse wheel on *both* the uptake spool and the feed spool, you should be able to control the speed be calculating the gear ratio between the two spools as they change during the job and adjusting the speed of the servo accordingly.. i think the big secret here is having an optical encoder which has enough slits to give the microcontroller enough information to react... but imagine this might not be too hard since the ratio should only change gradually as the paper is taken up..

.. sorry for the ramble ;)

[CU_Monkeys]

John, That is also a possibility and the laser cutter could actually produce that hole or notch so stock paper could still be used. The small deterrent to this would be that the holes or notches would be left in the finished product small as they might be.

[masterchippy]

Great project, as the takeup spool gets fuller it will pull more paper have you thought about using a system like in tape players a capstan and pinch roller pulling the paper and a slipping clutch linked to pull the paper? might get rid of some of the inconsistency. Thanks for a great instructable

[CU_Monkeys]

Thanks for the comment! We did discuss putting something together like you suggested. In the end we decided to go with the continuous servo because of time constraints and because it was what we knew :) If we had more time a tape player type roller would be a great benefit to this project!