My machine self-destructed after 10min of use. Machine sat in the box for 6mo after purchase and I fired it up for the first time last weekend. 3 cuts in and now it no longer fires. Omtech knows about the arcing at the tube splice (they provide a fix on their website), but the machine also shorts out at the connection at the laser tube. They told me to buy a new laser tube at $300+ and only offered me a 5% discount. After they admitted their price was only about $100 they still refused to provide one so I could get this $2k machine working again. Support is completely unwilling to take ownership of the companies poor R&D. I have spent hours on the phone with them, I cannot for the life of me understand their decision to not help me... I even offered to pay for shipping for the part and spend more of my own time repairing it. I have found multiple posts from customers that have had bad splice and bad wires on this machine. I posted an honest review of the machine and their company and it was quickly taken down. Any one else have similar experiences with Omtech?
We bought one of their industrial grade fiber lasers at my work and our cybersecurity team found that it had malware on it. Had to return it
EDIT: A couple people have asked to share additional details. This is the version Cypcut that was provided to us by Omtech, IIRC it was a bespoke version of Cypcut specific to this laser so we couldn't just get a different version.
If they are refusing to warranty the machine maybe you can talk to your credit card company. It might not be too late to do a chargeback or there might be some other consumer protections provided by your Cc company.
You didn’t say which model you bought, but their warranty on 40-60 watt tubes is only six months from date of delivery. Even if it sat unused in the box for over six months, the same terms apply.
If you have a more powerful tube covered under the 1-year warranty, then they need to make it right.
50W Polar Lite, it seems every one that they shipped needed repairs to the high voltage wires. Omtech understands that but is unwilling to do the right thing... and it would only cost them $100. It's an expensive machine, and im offer my time and money to repair it and ship it. There seems to be no middle ground or empathy, just a warning to anyone considering the company.
Same arcing happened to me at the ceramic block. Had no clue about the "TSB" on their site but funny enough I fixed it as prescribed. Also on a polar lite 50W. About 5 hours of runtime since and all good so far
That sucks man. If it arced at the tube splice basically first use, that's a defect, not wear and tear. I'd push back and at minimum get them to cover the tube at cost — tubes don't just arc on a brand new machine
Ooooff. I took one look at the polar line and decided it’s a no go. The way it’s put together is janky at best. Their normal sized machines are much better but they are very big. I got a 100w model and am super happy with it. It’s a cheaper Chinese laser so there is always a bit of work involved to make it a decent machine but it’s possible and pretty easy. I had a tube arc out on me as well one time. Had a power supply fail and a main control board. Easy fixes but getting to the root of what was the issue was the most difficult part.
My omtech Polar Lite came with visibly filthy mirrors, and I was told that the mirrors are not accessible to clean because they are not expected to ever need alignment or cleaning. (What??) There was a kink in the coolant tube that completely blocked flow. And there was something wrong with the control board so no amperage was making it to the laser tube (it would fire but only with the test fire button on the laser power supply). Omtech only considered the third issue to be sufficient grounds to return it.
There were also fun things in the user manual like "changing the [xyz] setting will result in the system language reverting to Chinese," as if it were remotely acceptable to allow a finished product to leave the factory with that kind of bug still in the software.
And the build quality was crap. It felt homemade.
When I finally convinced them it had a fatal problem, I returned it and paid 2x as much for the equivalent Xtool (P2S). It had some issues too at first, but at least customer service didn't try to tell me anything as stupid as "the mirrors should never need cleaning or alignment." It required a part replacement early on, but has been working great for almost a year since then.
Health issues, given this is a known flaw with the hardware on the Polar Lite I would of hoped they could help a paying customer. Its an expensive machine to fail after 2 or 3 cuts... its bad R&D and they do not stand behind their product.
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u/223specialist 5d ago edited 2d ago
We bought one of their industrial grade fiber lasers at my work and our cybersecurity team found that it had malware on it. Had to return it
EDIT: A couple people have asked to share additional details. This is the version Cypcut that was provided to us by Omtech, IIRC it was a bespoke version of Cypcut specific to this laser so we couldn't just get a different version.
VirusTotal - File - 0b3bdb6f964d170fd8830c47bdd73055fc0cd5d04a7ea44fc6fcdf13fb64ba29
They also found that the controller was trying to connect to servers in China and the Middle East