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FrozenGate by Avery

My First HeNe! Pics, Setup, and Beamshot!!!

IsaacT

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Hello everybody :) So I recently got my first HeNe tube as a gift from Cheech226. She is so small and looks like something right out of a Sci-Fi movie. It is great! He didn't have a power supply though so after making a thread and receiving some advice from Daguin(Thank you!!!) I purchased this power supply:

HeNePS2.jpg


When it got here, I realized that I had to figure out how to power the damn thing. The datasheet said 4.5V-6V in @ 1-1.3A, so I set off to Fry's. Nothing. They had nothing short of Bench PSU's that could do that. After a lot of thinking though, I went back to Fry's and got the following:

THE LIST:
1 x Project Box (Black)
1 x (4)AA Battery Holder
1 x Flip Switch
5 x Packs Tenergy AA Batteries

See I figured that AA batteries would be able to handle the current and with the battery holder being in series, I would have 6V! So problem solved, right? Wrong. Upon getting home and putting everything together, nothing was happening. So back to square one....or so I thought.

See, turns out I needed to use 3 wires from the Power Supply rather than just two. One of the wires "enables" the unit, and that is the one I hadn't soldered. So this morning when I realized that I went outside and put everything together again, this time with the enabler.


WHAM!!! A jolt of electricity at 1250V slammed into my body! I had never worked with high voltage before, so needless to say....it was a shock! Good news: My power supply was working and ready. Bad news: I was now shaking a little bit, and the bond I had made from the AA holder to the Project Box was now loose due to me dropping it. (Yes, I looked like an idiot. No, I don't have a video. Yes, I did laugh at myself)

So without any more rambling, here are some pictures:

The inside of the project box....I need to add a ground screw though, so it isn't finished :p inside joke some of you will know about....for those of you who don't, read THIS thread(my first ever laser build). Looks like the photos in the OP have dissapeared but I linked straight to a POST with my ground screw mod :p



And now the whole of it put together....I decided to drill a couple holes and keep the laser on the box by use of Zip ties. If and when I can find some black ones I will change them out, but for now these will do.





And now Beam/Plasma shots!!!! These were a little difficult to do because if I kept the normal settings, the plasma would make my pictures flare pretty bad. So I had to reduce my aperture to let less light through. But if I did that you could barely see the laser. So what I ended up doing was taking a napkin, putting it in front of the flash to lessen the effect while still keeping the smaller aperture. That way you could easily see the laser AND the plasma.











Well, that is it, I really hoped you all enjoyed seeing my first gas laser! One small step for a hobbyist :p I want to again thank Cheech226 for the Tube and all of the people who helped me with my questions(Daguin, Sigurther, LaserBee, Cyparagon, and Bionic Badger) it really means a lot to me that those with knowledge deign to answer the questions of those who need it, especially so quickly. This forum is a great place to be :beer:

Thanks,
Isaac
 





Good job!

Now how long can it run on your AA batteries?

BTW. Welcome to the gassy side ;)

Peace,
dave
 
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I heard the gas is greener over here :p

And yeah I guess we will find out. When my wallwart arrives I may change it over. If I get really good runtimes though I may just leave it as is and save the wart for a rainy day :)
 
glad it worked for you isaac! it is a cool little tube.
when you want the gas to be greener pm me.
 
Well let me tell you that laser just looks cool... it might not be very powerfull but what it lacks in power it has in looks. Congratulations on your new gas laser, I hope to be able to post some pictures of my gas lasers as soon as I have them set up and working (still waiting on a power cord to be delivered).....
 
Dammit. I usually post my standard warning about how to avoid getting "bitten" when I see someone looking for their first HeNe but didn't this time. Personally I just wear gloves if I have to move a bare tube that I can't let sit and bleed off its charge.

Anyhow nicely done man! :beer: I've got a portable HeNe build planned out that some day I'll eventually build.

As dagiun said welcome to the club. Unfortunately you're now infected with the gas laser bug. Next you'll want a green one then maybe a bigger red then you'll want to step up to the "big leagues" and get an argon then go batshit crazy like me and decide you want a yellow and orange to have a "complete set" of HeNes. Yeah, it's a sickness. :eg:
 
Ahh very good! So it wasn't input power but rather you forgot to wire in the enable! (Which I told you to do early on in your other thread before you said it wasn't working =P)

Yes, welcome to the gas population inversion club! (Negative) Resistance is Futile.
 
I'm feeling a bit gassy myself...as soon as these 3 permanent collection builds are done, I am saving for a multi-line ArgonIon....must have...
 


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