Adding a laser to my Woodmizer twin blade edger

[scsmith42]

I've been looking for ways to speed up my edging activities.  One of our markets is where we take customer logs, mill, dry and then process them into flooring, T&G ceiling boards, siding, etc, to be used in their home being built on the site where the trees grew.  These are multi-month projects and usually we'll do 6 or so per year.  Right now I have three in-process, two of them are for 3000 - 5000 sq. ft of finished flooring in flooring strip lengths up to 20'.

I use an edger extensively to create the moulding blanks.  Typically for a 5-1/2" wide floor we will mill at around 8" green.  There will be 12% or so shrinkage during the drying process, and usually the boards may crook a bit.  The moulder produces the highest quality product if we feed it with straight blanks, and I've found that a two blade edger is faster to produce blanks than a single blade straight line rip saw (one pass versus two).  However, it can be tricky to take a 16' - 20' board and feed it straight enough to make a clean pass from end to end.  Over that length, if you're even off a small amount it can cause you to have to cut the blank short and lose yield (and increase time).  

After seeing that sweet Baker Edger at Jake's get-together last month, it spurred me on to add a laser to mine (along with the fact that I have several thousand board feet of boards that need to be processed into moulding blanks this week).  



 


I'm not as concerned right now with having a laser on the movable blade - mainly the stationary one.  Using the fence is not a great option when you have a crooked board.

I started with sourcing a 200MW green laser off of e-bay for around 80 bucks delivered.  The sheet metal mount leaves a lot to be desired in terms of hardiness, but I figured that I'd start with it for proof of concept and then machine a heavier mount out of aluminum if the concept proved valid.

Here is the edger before I started.



 

Initially I held the laser up by hand to determine the best compromise between overall height versus how far the beam would cover.



 

Then cut a support bracket and mounting plate (material sourced from my scrap steel rack).



 

TIG weld them together 



 



 

and paint. 



 

And finally install on the edger.



 



 

Eureka!  The line is visible and is stable when the machine is running.  I have less than $100 cash outlay even with the cost of the paint and hardware.  I'll use it for a while and if I have problems with it staying aligned, I'll machine a new mounting base to replace the flimsy sheet metal one that came with the laser.

[customsawyer]

That's about as cheap as I have ever heard of anyone adding a laser. Nice job. It's difficult to get the mounting place right. I like to keep it as close to the material as possible but you have to be careful you're not hitting it when returning boards that need run twice.

[scsmith42]

I concur.  I staggered the mount a few inches to the side so as to allow more room for board return.

It will be interesting to see how durable the laser is, considering the price.

My next evolution will be to machine a more robust mount for the laser itself, and to put a shield on it to keep the laser from striking my eyes when infeeding the boards.

[KWood255]

Any update on the laser setup on your edger? I would like to get something similar for mine. Thanks

[Freedy201]

Now that's thinking like a sawyer-engineer! I've spent more time than I'd like to admit trying to eyeball a straight cut down a 20-foot board, feels like threading a needle with a 2x8. That green laser looks way more stable than I'd expect for something off eBay

[John S]

I just installed a 100mw laser on my LT40, still not bright enough.  Where did you buy your 200mw and what is the diameter of the housing?  Thanks,

[scsmith42]

Laser update. It's still working fine and staying within tolerance. The only problem that I've had is some corrosion that develops where the wire from the transformer plugs into the wire to the laser. That's easily resolved  by twisting the connector.

I sourced my laser off of eBay several years ago. I just checked and there's several 200 MW green lasers listed on eBay.

The most challenging part of my project was not being able to find a robust mount that allowed precise alignment of the laser and multiple dimensions. Some of the newer ones may now offer that.

[123maxbars]

Nice set up, I might do the same to my edger,