Are these bad diodes?

ok, i've been settings these aside as it seems like 1 out of 5 builds do this....
not knowing for sure whats causing it, or even if the diode is crap...i didn't want to throw them away, nor did i want to use them as they seem faulty.
some info.......
it's being powered at 100mA with a rkcstr driver (was 120 and then i lowered it trying to troubleshoot...)
it's using 2x 3.6 CR2 batteries that ARE charges and putting out 8.4v, and i even tries it using 6v from fresh regular 3v CR2 batteries and got the same effects...
any ideas?
i'm about to replace the diode and wanted to post a video before i disassembled it.
eventually it will go completely out and not work, but if you let it sit for about 10 minutes, you can turn it on and it'll go back to flickering like that.
here is the video....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rmw8Qe6oKQk

wow havent seen one do that yet :-/

john lawson said:

wow havent seen one do that yet  :-/

Click to expand...

this isn't the only time....... seems to happen regularly.
either the build is perfect....or it does that.

this is the third one i've seen do this.....
would soldering the third pin and making the diode case negative have anything to do with it? if so i may have to go back to my old design of actually drilling a hole into the side of the module and feeding the neg wire out......


i just notice your sig....3000 watts? you got a video?!

I only have flickering in my lasers when the battery runs out. Since we're ruling that out, it could either be the PHR itself or the driver.

Th0ughts said:

I only have flickering in my lasers when the battery runs out. Since we're ruling that out, it could either be the PHR itself or the driver.

Click to expand...

hmm.....
well i am about to test a new diode.....so if it starts doing the same i'll try to rule out the driver.

i've got 5 drivers on the way so it'll be a day or two before i know.....

Those 3000 Watts of power are RMS power, from his stereo.

i had it happen to me one time and thats with a flexdriver when the batt gets low :-? :-?

yea i may remove that its kinda missleading although having three 600 watt and 1 1000 watt amp is pretty cool

ok!
so i put on a brand new phr diode....same effect!
don't know whether i should be made or glad

ok....so now i turn my attention to the rkcstr driver.....which component would you suspect first?

i have alot of spare parts so i'd like to repair this driver if possible..... should i try the regulator first?
or the caps?

Darn right it's cool I'd just add RMS Stereo power in there & leave it as is!!!!!!!!!!!

hey do you get the drivers as kits unassebled or pre-assembled :-?

This is an interesting problem, I would rule out the diode as it would just die permanently or LED, definitely not flicker.

The flickering suggests a contact problem to me, I can't think of anything in the driver that would cause such a problem.  Try taking out a driver with this problem and see if it still happens when you apply power directly to the inputs of the driver.  

See if the problem is affected by orientation, or if gently shaking the laser can correct it/make it worse.

If the flickering persists even when the diode+driver is not inside a host and just powered directly then I would just have to guess at the problem.  I would start by checking the joints with a magnifying glass for any very tiny shorts between pads, after that I would swap out the capacitors.  

It is perhaps plausible that a damaged capacitor could render the circuit unstable, however generally this would not cause flickering, just ripple in the output.  The capacitor is the only component I could really imagine causing this problem, the regulator would be very hard to damage and would probably fail outright.

Again, when I see flickering I think contacts, I would not assume that this is a problem with the components. You said that you may have to go back to drilling a hole and feeding a wire out, this implies to me that this problem is new for this style of build which again points to a connection problem. Do you have this kind of issue with other builds?

When I have my lava 2 volts, it flickered, with low output

The lava driver will flicker but that's because it operates on a different principle. A boost driver uses pulses of electricity and an inductor to step up the voltage, however a linear driver will never produce pulses.

looks like a bad pot.....i have a red that i pot modded and i must of damaged it and when i swapped it out with a micro one from R.S. it worked fine

Pull the module out, power it JUST on the batteries alone (touch a battery to the + spring, and a wire leading from the case of the aixiz to the - on the battery) and that will tell you if it is the driver or if it is a connection somewhere. I'm guessing it's a connection issue though. There's nothing really on the rkcstr driver that would cause that, except for a faulty pot (but still that would really be on or off...) or an overheating regulator, which is also unlikely.