by bdring » Sat Jan 02, 2010 5:03 pm
The extraction blower is trying to pull the air out of the cabinet. It needs a fresh source to work efficiently. Any extra open intake area will help. I filtered my intake to prevent dust from entering the enclosure.
Some types of smoke are really bad to linger around. Wood smoke tends to stick to anything and would ruin a mirror. Some plastics have some nasty stuff like chlorine gas which can wreak havoc. I know not to cut PVC, but I saw some cool vinyl record laser cuttings on the Internet. When I tried it, it made some nasty smoke that corroded some metal.
The air assist is designed to keep the the smoke out of the cutting beam and away from the lens. You definitely want to make sure the air source is clean from dust, particles and especially smoke. I used a cheap water filter cartridge on my pump intake.
As long as the air comes from a clean source, the air assist should not be bothered by the extra smoke. The volume of air coming from my air assist is small compared to that of the extraction blower.
Bart
"If you didn't build it, you will never own it."