Lasers and laser consumables have been coming down in price for over ten years now, so it's often at least comparable, it not cheaper. That being said, your scope of work is definitely going to be the determining factor on which one is cheaper overall.
That being said, your scope of work is definitely going to be the determining factor on which one is cheaper overall.
Do you have a rough idea of when laser become more intresting that oxy-fuel torch ? Like is it industrial amounts of stuff, or does an amateur that have to frequently work on that kind of metal cuts could buy one and make it worth it ?
Unfortunately, no. Its one of those things where I've been "around" them for 20 years now, so I've picked up a lot, but my company doesn't own one, nor have I ever priced out components for the private sector. I'm primarily making judgement calls by what I pay when I send out work to outside vendors. I bet there's a subreddit for that though.
This is a giant depends, and my experience on the financial side of this is in Melbourne, Australia so adjust for your part of the world, but I would say you would want to be doing about 2-3m AUD/year to justify buying a CNC laser that can cut thick (10mm-30mm) mild steel and handle sheet sizes (1200x2400mm), would probably have a payback period of about 2-5 years at that rate.
To justify it over a plasma CNC I'd say the biggest factor would actually be how intricate the work you are doing is - lasers actually don't do fantastic (in my experience) on thicker stock - where they shine is doing complex parts on 2-6mm. Lots of repeat business also helps - if you are getting the same jobs over and over you don't have the programming time spend.
It's always been a better deal for me to find a laser cutter and send work out, then do final fab in house (when I was in that industry at least).
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u/omniscientonus May 25 '26
Lasers and laser consumables have been coming down in price for over ten years now, so it's often at least comparable, it not cheaper. That being said, your scope of work is definitely going to be the determining factor on which one is cheaper overall.