Portable Dual Laser For Most Materials – LaserPecker LP4

Today were taking a look at the compact and portable LaserPecker LP4, it’s a really interesting dual laser engraver that combines a 10w blue diode laser and 2W 1064 Infra-Red laser all in one device. With 2 lasers in one machine it means we can almost engrave on any material. Along with the LP4 we’ll be looking at a couple of useful accessories like the rotary attachment, that lets you engrave on round objects and the slider bed for larger projects.

Key Specs

Portable Dual-Laser for almost any material
Easy to operate
10w Diode and 2w 1064 Laser built in
120x160mm Work Area
160x300mm Work Area with Slider
Opening Base
Rotary Attachment for Curved objects
Free included LaserPecker Design Space Software
8k Resolution 0.0019mm Movement Accuracy
Engrave speeds up to 4000mm/s
Galvanometer Mirror System
Touch Screen
Emergency Stop Button
Overheat and Tilt protection

Unboxing and Assembly

Everything comes well packaged and there’s everything needed to get started. The LP4 is fairly easy to assemble, the manual has clear step by step instructions that are easy to follow. It’s just a matter of bolting the base plate to the motorized upright with 4 screws.Then attaching the laser unit and tightening the underside knob. There’s a lens protective cover to remove and then the protective shield is installed. This just snaps into place and this is held on with magnets.

It’s got an exhaust fan to remove smoke and fumes from the work surface, although for best fume extraction you’ll want to add the optional hose and air purifier attachment.At the back there’s a few cables to plug in, one for the exhaust fan, one for the motorized upright and one for the power supply. At the side a cable management clip neatly holds the cables. And with the assembly complete we can put on the included safety glasses and its ready to go for the first project.

Overview and Tour Around the Laser

What sets the LP4 apart from other lasers, is it’s equipped with a dual laser system, that combines 2 lasers inside with a 10w 450 nanometer blue diode laser, that’s good for engraving woods, acrylic, glass, leather, stone, some metals, and it is also capable of cutting wood up to 8mm. There’s also the 2W 1064 infrared laser that is good for engraving metals like Stainless Steel, Aluminium Alloy, Gold, Silver, and Plastics.

At the top we find the round colour touch screen and this used to switch between laser modes, preview jobs and re run stored jobs from the history. And with stored files on the device, this means we can start and operate the machine even without a computer or phone attached.

Just below the touch screen and at the front we have a handy LED light bar that indicates the machines operating mode. There a convenient top handle and this has an emergency stop button built in. At the side we have a magnetic dust cover that can be removed if we ever need to access or clean the fans.

At the back we find all the connection ports with two USB-A for 5V output and the USB-C for PC connection and there’s a port power cable. Although while you won’t find a physical power switch on the machine, but we can shut down the machine into sleep mode via the touch screen.

Underneath there’s the 2 red lasers used for the focusing. And we have a protective cap covering the lens. And towards the back is the mounting point.

We can adjust the height of the laser by raising or lowering using the Up/Down buttons on the electric stand or in the LasperPecker design space App an it can also be control in the design space Software. The height adjustment is used to focus the laser on the material and when the 2 red dot combine into one it’s in focus. Its a quick and simple process to complete.

Connection

The LP4 can be operated using a mobile device either a phone or tablet or from a desktop computer. A mobile devices connect via Bluetooth while a PC can connect via Bluetooth with the LaserPecker Bluetooth Dongle or connect with the USB cable.

The laser can also be used to re-run jobs directly from the touch screen without a PC or Mobile connection as the device stores a history of previous engraving jobs.

Working Area

The engraving area of 120 mm x 160 mm is a good size for small engraving projects. The LP4 is also able to be used at multiple angles, and we can open the base plate enabling it to engrave on large-sized materials that might not fit on the base. It’s a highly modular and expandable device that should be able to cover most small DIY engraving projects.

If you do want to work on something slightly larger the Slide Extension accessory expands the workspace to 160 mm x 300 mm.

Speaking of accessories there’s also the Rotary Extension, a base Cutting Plate, the LP4 Laser Protection Cover, a Desktop Air Purifier and a Bluetooth dongle for PC. We’ll take a close look at some of items these during the tests.

First Project via Phone App

For the first project we have the LaserPecker APP downloaded on a mobile and from here we can connect, prepare and send jobs to the machine. So for this example we’ll select the LaserPecker logo from the clip art icon. This can be moved and re-positioned on the screen, then clicking on preview will give us an outline of the image. Moving the image on the device also gives us a real time positions on the piece of wood, which makes it super quick and easy to setup job.

Now with a piece of wood on set up on the base there’s 2 red dots to focus, and by using the up and down arrows these two dots are moved closer together and when the meet together forming one dot, the laser is in focus. So with the file sent to the machine we can set up the engraving settings and start the job. This is engraved with the default basswood settings using the 450 nanometer 10W blue diode laser at 39% power at an 86% depth. The job is complete in 44 seconds and the result turned out really well.

Air Purifier

Now there was a bit of smoke and burnt wood smell in the room, so were going to install the air purifier unit to help remove unwanted smells and smoke. Inside the unit is a filter cartridge that has a 4 stage filter system with a cotton pre-filter, a HEPA filter, an activated carbon filter and a second HEPA filter at the bottom.

For the connection one tube connects to the back of the protective cover on the laser then into the top port on the back of the air filter. A second tube connects to the bottom port and then this can be ducted outdoors. Now we just need to plug in the power cable and turn on the power switch.

At the front power and fan speed is adjusted by the plus and minus buttons, there’s 4 levels to choose from and this is displayed with a blue led light bar. Running the same test again there was a huge improvement in smoke and fume reduction and there was hardly any small at all.

The air purifier worked really well but one thing that might need to be updated on the unit is the blue LED light to a different color. As when wearing the googles these block blue light so apart from hearing the sound, visually it was hard to tell what level the purifier was on.

Software

While the machine can be used with an app it can also be used with the free LaserPecker design Space software on a PC or even Light Burn if you prefer. And if you want stored files on the machine can be re processed without any other device connected.

The LP Design Space software is easy to use with a basic user friendly layout, on the left we can use the tools to draw, import an image, add text, create QR codes or barcodes, create shapes and insert clip-art. So with a picture added we can adjust the effect, trace an image to give us an outline and this can be filled for an engraving and an offset added to cut it out the design. There’s plenty of basic tools that allow you to prepare files for engraving. Now with a file prepared and the machine connected there’s a list preset material setting to choose from, and we can fine tune settings for the power and speed. Now for the speed this is displayed as a depth percentage but it’s good to see there’s also the mm/s listed in the software which I prefer to use.

Aluminum Business Card

For the next test were engraving this detailed cat deign onto one of the included aluminum business cards. This is engraved using 1064 IR laser and using the Aluminum Oxide setting with an 8K resolution, 100% Power and a 30% depth. This took about 2 minutes to complete at this high resolution the final result produce was an impressive super crisp and clean image.

Projects with 450nm Diode

A few more projects I completed with the 10W blue diode laser was engraving a design onto a lid of a box. This set with a 1k 80% power and 72 depth 324mm/s. The design turned out well looking nice and clean. Once completing this I also thought it would be a good idea to engrave a thank-you note on the inside of the box lid. Using the same setting this gave an excellent result. Sticking with the blue laser for another test, I engrave a cork coaster with setting of 1K resolution 20% power and a depth of 57% (758mm/s). It’s another quick and easy project that turned out well.

Projects with 1064 IR

Now for a few more quick test with the 2W 1064 IR laser. The first one is engraving a clip-art image onto a small heat-sink. This is engraved at 1K resolution with 100% power and an 81% depth (152mm/s). It’s interesting seeing these small engravings and a great way to customize items. The next test is engraving on a piece of black acrylic to make a key tag, the settings used for this are the Default Acrylic with the 1064 IR 4k resolution setting of P36% 72% depth or (92.2mm/s) the text on the acrylic looks nice and laser produced a good result.

Rotary Attachment

So the rotary attachment allow us to engrave on curved surfaces, this is a really well designed part it has an adjustable angle as well as adjustable clamps. There’s different shaped and sized clamps included that attach onto the tool that are good for holding small and larger objects. When engraving longer round objects there’s also an adjustable roller that can help support the item.

To use the rotary attachment the riser block is installed to reposition the laser unit higher, this gives us a bit more room to work under the laser. Then we just need to plug in a few cables and a rubber block is placed under the rotary tool keep it level.

So to test out the rotary we’re engraving a logo on to this coated stainless steel water bottle. As it was the first attempt with the rotary tool, I used some masking take on the bottle to double check the logo would be centered. With everything looking good the tape is removed, and the job is started. For the engraving we have the 2w 1064 IR laser set to a 2K resolution at 67% power and at a 20% depth (1307mm/s). It took about 12minutes to complete and the finished result for the first attempt was way better than expected. I’m pleased with the results and the logo is nice and clean with sharp details and my probably my favorite project completed with the LP4.

Slider Attachment

Now the LP4 has a working area of 120x 160mm and we can also remove the base plate to engrave onto various items that are too large to fit under the laser. There’s also a slider bed attachment that expands the working area to 300mm x 160mm. This slider can be used for engraving onto a larger sized object or even used for batch processing. The next test is engraving an airplane image onto a Plywood board, for this were using the 10w Blue diode laser with 67% power at a 30% depth (2002mm/s). The engraving took about 9 minutes to complete and the finished project gave a nice result that looks good.

Final Thoughts

Over all the LP4 was easy to setup and use, and the modular design allows it to be setup for different engravings and it produced some great results that I was happy with. Both the slider and the rotary attachments work well with the laser and expand the capabilities of the machine.

I do wish the LP4 was fully enclosure just like the optional accessory for the newest more powerful LP5 model. There is a protective cover avaliable but I think the LP5 safety enclosure is the better design.

As with most lasers it does produces a bit of smoke and fumes when in use, while the fan on the protective cover removes most of it out the back, I’d recommend getting the air purifier if you’re planning on using it indoors.

The compact design with 2 different lasers in one device does a really good job with fine engraving covering a variety of materials and projects. If you wanting to mainly surface engrave wood and metal with smaller portable form factor, I think the LP4 is a versatile and useful machine.

Product Links

New LP5

Additional Laser Safety Information
https://www.lasersafetyfacts.com/
https://cpl.org/wp-content/uploads/NEVER-CUT-THESE-MATERIALS.pdf

Watch the full detailed video review here : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7fP8NhCHX1I

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