Laser cutting technology - a commercial perspective : Fiber or CO2 laser – which one to buy next?

Since the advent of commercial fibre and disk laser cutting machines there has been a lot of controversy about the performance of these devices – particularly in comparison to their more established CO2 counterparts. In the early days the sales staff promoting fibre technology would often declare that the new lasers would completely take over from CO2 technology very quickly – but this has not happened. Even taking into account the entrenched position of the older technology, fibre and disk lasers have not been as widely accepted as was predicted, although they have been proven to outperform CO2 lasers in certain important areas. This article presents a discussion of the advantages and disadvantages of both types of cutting technology from a commercial point of view – written from the perspective of a laser cutting jobshop owner trying to decide between buying a fibre or CO2 laser cutting machine.