TOOCAA L2 : Laser Engraver & Cutter

Although we usually focus on 3D printing, and as we have mentioned on multiple occasions, if we are fond of making our own projects, we cannot miss a good laser engraver and cutter in our workshop.

Today we bring you the TOOCAA L2, a perfect machine if we want to start in this world since its characteristics will allow us to carry medium-sized projects and work with a wide range of materials.

Before getting into the subject, you may not know TOOCAA, a brand created in 2022, although its origins date back to 2011 developing projects with Arduino and other peripherals, with the aim of creating reliable and safe laser cutting machines… launching the sensational TOOCAA L2 on the market in 2024 and that today we will analyze you.

As always before continuing with the article, remind you that you can join 3DWork on our Telegram channel full of 3D printing deranged, or on our social networks Facebook, Twitter, Instagram.

Types of Laser Machines

Before going into more detail about the characteristics of the TOOCAA L2 we would like to explain the different types of lasers and what types of uses are usually suitable.

Tipo de láser	Descripción	Usos/Materiales
Diode	Diode laser engravers are a type of solid-state lasers.  A diode is a semiconductor that is made by combining p-type and n-type materials.  One side of the diode is p-type and the other side is n-type. The rays coming from the diodes are deflected by mirrors and passed through a converging lens.  The laser beams converge on a very fine point that produces intense heat.  The material on which the laser beams strike vaporizes quickly.	If you’re looking for a laser machine for crafting or starting a small business, a diode laser is a suitable choice, as it can cut and engrave a wide range of materials that we commonly use. Diode laser machines can easily cut wood, plywood, acrylic (opaque), cardboard, paper, and leather.  These are the common materials that almost all laser diode machines can cut according to their power. Materials that can be engraved with a diode laser engraver include wood, plywood, acrylic, paper, leather, metals, glass, ceramics, and a few more materials.
CO2	In a CO2 laser engraver, a discharge tube is filled with numerous gases, where CO2 is in the highest proportion, which is why the laser is called a CO2 laser.  The other gases inside the discharge tube are hydrogen, helium, oxygen, nitrogen, and xenon. There are two electrodes at the ends of the discharge tube.  When a high voltage is applied to the electrodes, the nitrogen molecules are excited.  In the excited state, the molecules are in a metastable vibratory state.  These molecules excite the CO2 molecules present in the discharge tube.  When excited CO2 molecules come into contact with helium molecules, intense energy is released in the form of light or photons.  These photons are the laser beams that are used to cut and engrave materials. The light or laser beams coming out of the tube are quite powerful.  They instantly increase the temperature of the object that comes into contact and vaporize the material in a short time.	Las máquinas láser de CO2 son mejores que las máquinas láser de diodo en términos de materiales de corte. Pueden cortar y grabar una gama más amplia de materiales. Y debido a que su longitud de onda de 10,640 nm absorbe la mayoría de los no metales, los grabadores láser de CO2 pueden funcionar en casi todos los no metales. Un láser de CO2 puede cortar madera, madera contrachapada, MDF, acrílico (todos los colores), espuma, papel, cartón, cuero, plástico, tela y caucho. Los materiales que puede grabar un láser de CO2 son acrílico (todos los colores), madera, madera contrachapada, MDF, cuero, plástico, tela, caucho, ladrillo, cerámica, hueso y metales revestidos.
Fibre	Fiber laser engravers are also a type of solid-state laser.  They get energy from diode lasers or other types of lasers, then the energy is activated and amplified by an optical fiber doped with rare earth elements. The amplified laser beams are of high power.  The final laser that comes out of the converging lens is capable of cutting metals.	Fiber laser machines can cut and engrave most metals and some non-metals.  It cuts and marks metals that other laser machines can’t do.  They can engrave and cut aluminum, brass, copper, ceramic, tungsten, chrome, painted metal, fiberglass, carbon fiber, nickel, silver, gold, stainless steel, plastics, etc.

We consider this important information before choosing one type of machine or another. Depending on the materials we want to work with, using one type or another will be key to good results, we also have to take into account the safety measures of use of each type of machine.

In general, and especially for first steps with this type of machine, diode machines are usually the most suitable because they have a more contained size, ease of use and less knowledge/maintenance.

Other important aspects are:

• the power of the laser that demonstrates the ability to cut and engrave materials.
• speed as it will allow greater control and combination with the power of the laser to combine these two aspects to obtain a greater variety of options in cutting/engraving

We hope that this brief overview will be useful for you in the correct choice of your machine.

TOOCAA L2

The TOOCAA L2, as we have already mentioned, is a medium-sized laser machine that mounts a class 1 diode laser that we can find in two powers (10W or 20W) designed for easy use and with a good number of safety measures more than useful in this type of machine.

The TOOCAA L2, thanks to its design and enclosure, allows effective gas/smoke extraction and has a printing area of up to 415*395 mm.

In addition, thanks to its laser modules, we can work with a multitude of materials, whether for engraving or cutting.

Other notable features of this TOOCAA L2:

	Robust protected kinematics for improved reliability and accuracy.
	The modular laser head with several powers available has a convenient chassis lock system and another for height adjustment for the laser focus. Finally, we also have the option of assisted air.
	Protection against opening the enclosure by pausing/stopping work for safety.
	Inclusion of a gyroscope that allows work to be paused/stopped in case of detecting machine movements.
	USB lock, not allowing the machine to be used if it is not installed.
	The laser head, which is Class 1 certified, has two sensors for flame detection.
	We also have interesting protections against movements that exceed mechanical limits and that will allow us to protect the machine from damage.
	Another feature that we found very interesting is the notification of events by means of an LED, in addition to acoustic signals.

Below you can find the specifications of this TOOCAA L2:

	TOOCAA L2 20W	TOOCAA L2 10W
Spot Size:	0.15*0.27 mm	0.075*0.18 mm
Work Area:	415*395mm	415*395mm
Engraving Speed:	400mm/s	400mm/s
Input Voltage:	24V / 5A	24V / 3A
Software:	LightBurn / LaserGRBL / TOOCAA Studio	LightBurn / LaserGRBL / TOOCAA Studio
Connection:	USB Type-C / TF Card	USB Type-C / TF Card
Machine Size:	645*617*306mm	645*617*306mm
Machine Weight:	13Kg	13Kg
Machine Material:	Aluminum Alloy	Aluminum Alloy
Enclosure Material:	Acrylic Plate / Aluminum Alloy	Acrylic Plate / Aluminum Alloy

We also have several interesting accessories to improve/expand the TOOCAA L2 which you can find in their online store:

• TOOCAA Smoke Purifier, extremely useful when we don’t have or as an extra measure in the extraction/cleaning of gases/fumes
• TOOCAA Honeycomb Panel, another accessory that is highly recommended to arrange the placed material safely and protect our printer base
• TOOCAA Air Assistant Kit, will allow us to reduce the burning effect on the material and a cleaner and more precise cut.
• TOOCAA Smart Camera is a camera that we can connect by USB to our computer to be able to use it as an aid in our control software to allow a position of our models
• TOOCAA Roller Rotary, in this case this accessory will allow us to make engravings on circular objects such as glasses, bottles, etc…

Commissioning

The TOOCAA L2 comes in a very complete kit where we find everything we need for the start-up and maintenance of the machine.

Everything comes perfectly packed and protected for transport.

Although seeing so many parts and accessories could overwhelm some, we have to say that most of the kit comes pre-assembled and assembling the rest can take us from 30m to 45m depending on our expertise.

The parts to be assembled are the enclosure, the one that will give us the most work, and the extraction system… In any case, we have a manual with all the detailed steps.
With respect to the enclosure, it is made up of six orange plexiglass panels 6 mm thick. We also have interior LED lighting to illuminate the entire work area.

The gas/fume extraction system that we have at the rear of the machine considerably improves the use of the machine in certain environments.

In our case, we opted for a 20W laser head to be able to work more easily with any material, especially thinking about cutting.
The laser head has a perfect and robust finish made of an aluminum body, including the chassis locking mechanism, the focus adjustment mechanism, the possibility of using an air assist kit or magnetic UV protection.
Another remarkable aspect of TOOCAA’s laser modules is that the connection of this to the management electronics is done easily with aUSB-C type cable with an anchor by a pair of screws.

In addition to the metal panel, with a honeycomb structure, which will allow us a better and safer cutting/engraving of our materials.
The panel has an average of 320*320*22 mm, which unfortunately does not occupy all the useful area that the TOCAA L2 can reach, it also comes with a 1mm aluminum sheet to protect the surface where we use our machine.

Finally, the assisted air kit for thelaser head that will allow us to reduce the burning effect on the material and a cleaner and more precise cut.
The construction of the same is excellent, it has a switch/potentiometer for ignition and airflow control that can generate about 30 liters/minute generating a noise level of about 40dB.

Adjusting the laser Focus

One aspect that we really liked about this TOOCAA L2 is its laser focus adjustment system for optimal results. In the laser head we find a mechanism that will allow us to adjust it easily.

The process is very simple:

• First we will place the material we want to operate
• On the right side of the head we will unlock the laser head to be able to adjust its height

• We will unfold the mechanism on the left side of the laser head that we can see in the following image and we will adjust the height of the head

• Once we have the head at the right height, we will simply lock it back into the correct position and pick up the mechanism on the left side

User Experience

As we mentioned before, this machine has a series of safety measures that will be of great help to us and that we must take into account when we handle these machines:

To be able to use the TOOCAA L2, and within its security measures, we have a USB lock key… basically it is a USB dongle that must be connected in order to use the machine… without it installed, it is not possible to start it up.

To prune the TOOCAA L2 we have different options such as Lightburn, which is the one recommended for the number of options and direct support… although it is paid we can do a free 30-day trial, LaserGRBL … free, less intuitive perhaps and limited in options/support, or TOOCAA Studio which is also free and we can use it from the web browser, this being the simplest of the 3 we have used.

Once we have everything ready, it is important to take into account the order in which the machine is switched on, since we have several independent components… 
we will start by connecting the air extraction ventilation of the enclosure, we will continue with the assisted air pump to the head and finally we will turn on the machine from the switch that we have on the right side of the TOOCAA L2.

The next steps before starting to cut/engrave would be to place the metal panel for cutting, if you do not have it we recommend a smooth metal plate that prevents the laser from cutting the surface where we have installed our TOOCAA L2.
On top of this we will place the material that we want to cut/engrave and we advise you to fix it. For the honeycomb mesh metal panel we have some support/anchoring parts that can be very useful. Remember to try to leave the cutting/engraving area and parallel well aligned with the beginning to prevent our pieces from coming out out of square.
Finally, we will adjust the laser focus as explained in previous points.

Inside the microSD that we have in the kit there is an example file that we suggest you use as a test, it is designed to be used on wood. To print it with only the microSD inserted and all the previous steps done, we will press the front button of the printer once so that the TOOCAA L2 places the head at the origin and we will press the button again twice to start the process… In a few minutes we will have our first test finished!!

This entire process is well detailed in the manual/guide of the machine itself.

TOCAA L2 Material Settings

The TOOCAA L2 can engrave and cut a wide variety of materials, from thin as a sheet of paper, to materials such as leather or wood panels.

Below you can find some recommended parameters depending on the power of our laser head and the material we want to work with:

In any case, we always recommend that we carry out tests, which we can generate from the machine’s own operating application, on the material we decide to use to find the appropriate settings for our case.

Tests

We have not been able to have much time to test a wide variety of materials in depth outside of the most common, something that we will be sharing in our Telegram groups or social networks.
We have done some interesting projects mainly in wood that show all the potential we can get with this TOOCAA L2… the limit is going to be almost your imagination!!

Wood

We have to say that the TOOCAA L2 is an exceptional engraving/cutting machine for working with this material. 
The results in both engraving are very good and given the power of the laser head we can cut important thicknesses to be able to carry out projects of all kinds.

As we always do, and we strongly suggest, thefirst thing was to do a speed/power test that we can normally generate from the control program (Lighburn in our case) and from there we can adjust the cut/engraving lines appropriately.

Having the assisted air kit for the laser head is more than advisable in this material as it will allow cleaner finishes.

Once we did the test and some small projects, we started to design a stand/storage for our paintings at Onshape, which has some sensational tools for the design of parts for laser cutting.

The result could not have been more satisfactory and in a few minutes we had our design cut and ready to assemble. 
We made one of them personalized for a friend!!

During the cutting of one of the pieces we had a small incident, because of us, since one of the cuts caused one of the pieces to move and collide with the head and make it lose steps.
So as a tip, always try to have the material firmly fixed and that it is flat with the cutting platform.

Aluminum/Metal

Like the rest of the materials, the first thing we did is a test, more than in these materials they are especially interesting, since depending on the power/speed we can obtain shades/colors with metallic materials that will allow us to take our designs to another level.

Although we have done several projects such as keychains and trophies, we cannot share them for now :), just a few quick tests.

TOOCAA L2 uses a diode laser which can engrave on these types of materials without problem but we have other machines with fiber laser and we like the latter more for these materials… something that we already told you at the beginning of the article when we explained the different types of laser machines.

Textile/Felt

It is a material that we usually use to customize some of our projects, it is easy to work with laser cutters/engravers and gives a quality touch and finish.

In this case we had some figures made with our resin printers and we created some bases in this material with a personalized engraving for each of them. 
Obviously before we did the corresponding speed/power test to see which values to use in the different layers.

Slate/Stone

It is another very interesting material to work with laser as it allows you to do very successful projects and given the capabilities of the TOOCAA L2 we will obtain very good results.

Where to buy TOOCAA L2?

TOOCAA has an online store on their website where you can buy the TOOCAA L2 and its accessories/spare parts directly.

In any case, we provide you with some links to store/s as a reference:

TOOCAA L2