A laser engraver made from an old 3D printer
The Geeetech i3 had reached the end of its life as a printer. The frame, motors and motion axes were fine, so it became a laser engraver instead.
The old Geeetech i3 was no longer a usable printer. There was nothing wrong with the frame, the stepper motors or the motion axes though — and those do exactly what a laser engraver needs: move a point accurately across an XY plane.
A printer and an engraver are solving the same problem in the end. Only the tool at the end of the head changes.
What changed
The laser. A Creality laser head in place of the print head.
The voltage. The laser wants 24 V; the printer's electronics ran on 12 V. Step-up converters in between take 12 V to 24 V, which meant the original power supply could stay.
The mechanics. The metal mounting parts came from Amazon, and I designed and printed the remaining adapter pieces myself. There's a small circularity there that I enjoy: the last job the printer did was print the parts for its own conversion.
Why bother
Throwing away a working machine because its original purpose ran out is a poor reason. What the frame still had was the expensive, hard-to-make part — a rigid structure and accurate motion. What it was missing was cheap and orderable.
Now it engraves.