SF-AW210 build

Here it is! Several days of drilling, cutting, soldering, gluing, trial-and-error & lots of swearing and it's finally done.

Hotlights blue host from
Rkcstr v3
SF AW210 405nm
1.5-12v 300mA voltage selectable DC power supply @12v
Miscellaneous parts

My plan is to eventually get batteries & install a charging circuit inside the Warheads tin.

I realize the design is overly complicated, but it's my first build and I wanted to have fun with it... :na: plus I've been dying to find a use for these really nifty key switches I have lying around.

Turn on the toggle switch and the red LED starts flashing to indicate standby... then as soon as the key is turned the green LED comes on to indicate the laser is ready for action.

Trouble is, I really don't know what kind of output I'm getting. I started with the pot at its lowest setting and have been slowly increasing power. I can tell you that when tightly focused it will light a match with a green head in about 5 sec. To test for heat I let it run for 30 seconds with the lens off & turn it off, then when I touch the top of the module it feels a little warmer than body temp. Can anyone give me a ballpark estimate as to the output?

No matter what I tried I just couldn't get a beam shot... I guess the camera I'm using is not very sensitive to this wavelength but I can see the beam fairly easily in a dark room.

Thanks to Greg at Stonetek, Modwerx & everyone who has helped me out so far. I still have a 20x LPC-815 still in sled that wants to get out...

Anyone? Wanna take a guess at the output?

Tightly focused with Aixiz plastic lens, ~5 sec @6 inches to light a match? I'm not looking for anything exact, maybe just an educated guess... no pressure oke:

Nice build, I haven't seen one like that befor, different

Thanks... I admit it's a bit ghetto but I learned a lot & (amazingly ) it functions exactly as intended.

Without knowing how much current you're feeding the diode it's hard to say. I'm driving mine at 170mA that's peaked in the mid/upper 170s and is nice and stable at 165mw. I personally wouldn't drive it over about 175ma myself.

LtKernelPanic said:

Without knowing how much current you're feeding the diode it's hard to say. I'm driving mine at 170mA that's peaked in the mid/upper 170s and is nice and stable at 165mw. I personally wouldn't drive it over about 175ma myself.

Click to expand...

How do I measure the current now that everything is soldered together?

Good question. Hopefully one of the more experienced members can chime in with some help. I have an idea but I'd hate to fry your diode.

Since it's a linear driver, I believe you can put your DMM in Amps mode and place the DMM probes between the driver and the diode.

I'm pretty sure but not 100% so as LtKernelPanic said, hopefully someone else can chime in to confirm or refute this.

Look here:
http://laserpointerforums.com/f44/electronics-basics-reading-current-59293.html
....->
better not put a meter between driver and diode.
If it's a linear driver (I believe the rckstr IS), you can put the meter inplace of tailcap.

I think that is true for boost drives but not linear. If you use the dmm instead of the tailcap it will measure how much current the driver is pulling of the battery. But, as Edaimonium pointed out in post #9 of that thread,

Quote:
Originally Posted by Coherent Light View Post
That will give you the current draw the driver is pulling, and not what the LD is getting.
In the case of linear drivers - like LM317 LM1117, and all those drivers these green lasers use, it's the same current since they are one-side drivers.

It's DC/DC converters, or boost drivers, that have different currents at input and output.

Click to expand...

Kevlar said:

I think that is true for boost drives but not linear. If you use the dmm instead of the tailcap it will measure how much current the driver is pulling of the battery. But, as Edaimonium pointed out in post #9 of that thread,

Click to expand...

Great, in that case I have the perfect way to test it.

EDIT - SUCCESS!! Looks like it's doing about 140mA. What would be the output in mW?

I'm amazed that the module stays so cool. If I leave it on for a full minute it doesn't even feel above body temp. I guess that means the heatsink is doing it's job. I also added some thermal grease so that probably helps a little too.

It's hard to tell what the mW is without a LPM.

Here is a thread where some members did some testing. It should give you an "idea" of what your is putting out. :beer:

http://laserpointerforums.com/f38/blu-ray-445-diode-test-current-levels-long-life-44746.html

:thanks:

The first time I came across that chart I didn't understand it... if the diode really is consuming 140mA then the output should be 150mW plus. :thinking:

The mW is usually a bit lower than the mA being fed in so if you are sending 140mA in I would guess your getting about 125mW-130mW. That is with a standard lens. If you put a G-1 glass on there it might be more like 150mW--160mW.

But like I said, this is just a guess.