New, never used 100w Black & Red Cutter is arcing on setup...

While setting this machine up for the first time and pulsing the laser for alignment, the HV cathode/positive connection arced, and the laser never fired.

Searching through this forum I saw some connection ideas that are far better than the OEM manual. So, I removed and replaced the silicone again with a tubing insulator cut of from the air tube. Unfortunately, it's still arcing. Negative side is fine. Not sure what else to do besides wrap the hell out of it with HV 600v electrical tape from one end to the next and cover it with black flex tubing.

Before I make things worse, I'd like to see what ya'all think and how you might have remedied this problem. Maybe I'm missing something, did something wrong. Just frustrated and dead in the water right now.

Thank you!

We had the same thing on ours. We found out our tube was dead, one of the guys ran it not knowing that the water wasn't working and the water alarm didn't sound. so he killed the tube and the power supply.
Basically if the tube is dead, you have the massive voltage from the power supply coming into the laser with no where to go, so it arcs to body through the positive wire.
If you have fired it multiple time and it has arced you might have cooked your power supply too.

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Originally Posted by MrMusk

We had the same thing on ours. We found out our tube was dead, one of the guys ran it not knowing that the water wasn't working and the water alarm didn't sound. so he killed the tube and the power supply.
Basically if the tube is dead, you have the massive voltage from the power supply coming into the laser with no where to go, so it arcs to body through the positive wire.
If you have fired it multiple time and it has arced you might have cooked your power supply too.

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This is true- if you didn't use RTV silicone and fired it up enough times while it arced, the tube may be shot along with the power supply. Either way you may have damaged the power supply long term.

Thank you gentlemen, I appreciate it. Sorry for the delayed response.