RDWorks Learning Lab 222 Beam combiners A new approach

I looked at the performance of beam combiners more than 4 years ago and decided then that it was impossible to set them with any precision. I have managed for 6 years without one and at the last review, I power tested before and after to find a 5% power loss. I thought this was a heavy premium to pay for an unpredictable indication of where the beam would hit your work. Cloudray are most insistent that a beam combiner is the only way to provide a "red dot" for the lightweight head on the Russ Spec machine they have produced. I found myself with a dilemma......... agree to shipping a high spec high quality machine with a piece of known substandard kit or design a replacement that would do the job properly. I accepted the latter challenge and this video is an an analysis of the task to be performed and then testing the design that I created.