SAiK #3 "The Saiklops"

Previously titled "Battery incorrectly labeled - damage to diode/driver?"

Changed to turn this thread into my general laser experience with rhd's SAiK #3 or as I have now dubbed, "The Saiklops"

I recently joined up and immediately searched for a great first high-powered laser. I'm the type who doesn't usually begin with entry-level if I can afford getting the beasts anyway. rhd was a great person to talk to, and so were a couple of others whom I also considered getting my first laser from (you guys know who you are :beer. Arriving together with some other necessities from my freight forwarder (26650 battery and charger, 2 Uvex glasses, Eagle Pair), SAiK #3 arrived well-packed and tightly bubble-wrapped.

Before even getting home I parked my car and donned the Eagle Pair while promptly inserting the battery which I later found out to be incorrectly labeled--it was in reverse! I have both ben and rhd to thank for incorporating a reverse polarity protection circuit into the drivers, otherwise I would have just fried my first laser diode only minutes after receiving it. :thanks:

After getting the Saiklops to work, I adjusted the wide focus knob and proceeded to leave my very first laser mark on the delivery box.

About two weeks of laser life I stumbled upon one of Seoul_laser's threads on the G1/G2 lenses and since I live in a tropical country, I tried checking if my lens was affected. You can read my reply in that thread here. It had tons of spots and streaks; needless to say I was concerned. I used compressed air and silica gel packs which did little to help. Only then did I notice that the laser "dot" had quite a discernible "splash". Anyway, a week later I found a cheap ultrasonic cleaner and put the G1 through it twice. It is now considerably cleaner and the dot splash has lessened. I also noticed that it burns a lot better.

Here are some updated photos:

Detail of the diode inside the heatsink


DTR 405-G1


With the wide focus knob adapter


Eagle Pair plus Saiklops


I tried doing a close range test shot using split-second bursts... not a good idea


Beam shots
1/20 at ISO200


1/400 at ISO500


Here's my idea of a nice place to keep the Saiklops


Thanks for viewing folks :beer:

Original first post:

I didn't want to mess up rhd's FS thread so I started a new one about this issue.

In a nutshell: got a 2.2 445 from rhd, eagle pair from gary, a battery from 4sevens, its labeling was incorrect, i placed the battery in backwards, turned it on a few times, tried charging it a few times, then thought "what if this sticker is on wrong?" Trying it in the reverse position, the thing finally worked.

I complained to 4Sevens, and they told me they checked their stocks and that my issue was an isolated case, wth. They did apologize, but that isn't my problem right now. For the record, the 4Sevens battery is a 26650.

Is there some way to check if both drivers (dual Ben) and the diode is fine? The G1 seems fine with the thin line "dot". If one of the drivers is busted, will it still work albeit at ~850mA?

To answer rhd's last question:

rhd said:

It should be relative easy to tell - does it work ?

Click to expand...

Sure does. But is it still 2.2W? I made split second bursts on the Eagle Pair glasses at a 6" distance, and it immediately left singe marks on each one.



1/40 f/2.2 ISO3200



1/20 f/2.8 ISO2500

The 26650:

Re: Battery incorrectly labeled - damage to diode/driver?

Both drivers still work

Because of how they're paralleled, if one driver dies, the remaining driver would still see a set resistor value that would trigger it to attempt the full current. Of course, the driver wouldn't be able to do this on it's own, and the output would immediately pulse.

So, if it works, then both drivers are undamaged, and you're safe! (no thanks to Four Sevens!).

Re: Battery incorrectly labeled - damage to diode/driver?

What charger is that?

Re: Battery incorrectly labeled - damage to diode/driver?

rhd said:

So, if it works, then both drivers are undamaged, and you're safe! (no thanks to Four Sevens!).

Click to expand...

So still think reverse polarity protection isn't needed. :evil:

Re: Battery incorrectly labeled - damage to diode/driver?

jcranmer said:

So still think reverse polarity protection isn't needed. :evil:

Click to expand...

I caved about a week ago

http://laserpointerforums.com/f67/magic-driver-driver-add-teaser-73739.html

Re: Battery incorrectly labeled - damage to diode/driver?

So why is it still alive then? Answer: rhd's magic, as usual :eg:

Thanks, I can lase happy now.

ped said:

What charger is that?

Click to expand...

The charger is also a 4-7s. I got both off Amazon. Strangely, after a week the battery became unavailable for purchase.

Re: Battery incorrectly labeled - damage to diode/driver?

TomD said:

So why is it still alive then? Answer: rhd's magic, as usual :eg:

Thanks, I can lase happy now.

Click to expand...

Lol, this build didn't have the really really cool magic in it. Just my normal magic.

Changed the thread title to make this a general thread for my first laser.

Also added some photos. Let me know if they take too long to load, I had some difficulty resizing them in Ph0tobucket.

Cheers!

I recently got careless and discharged my 26650 battery too much. The beam dimmed a bit, flickered, then conked out. I put it in the charger. It kept saying "full/complete" and I panicked, thinking the discharge level was too low.

After taking the battery out of the charger and letting it rest a few minutes, I put it back and thankfully it now indicates "charging".

I did a bit of research but I'm unsure if these are accurate, or if they can be assumed safely. These capacity ratings are for a Li-Co cell. Let me know if these also apply to the 26650 I'm using.

4.2V Full 100%
4.1V About 90%
4.0V About 80%
3.9V About 60%
3.8V About 40%
3.7V About 20%
3.6V Empty
<3.5V Over discharged
<3.0V Cell damage occurs

I wanted to post in the Laser Hair Removal thread but it was recently necro'd and I wouldn't want to make it worse.

Don't ask me how it happened, but the beam hit the outer part of my left calf, not directly but vertically. It was only for about 1/4 of a second, and I felt it sting really bad. Upon closer inspection, I didn't have any visible burns, and instead I have a straight bald line about 3cm x 15cm where the hair burned clean off. That's with 2W, focused to infinity, and about an arm's length away from the calf.

I've been curious before but this is ridiculous. How can, say, three of these in parallel, outputting the same high wattage, not be considered a realistic threat similar to a firearm, especially at close range? (Nobody needs to answer that :evil

Next on my silly agenda is procuring several cheap square folding mirrors in the health and beauty section of some store, laying them out on the floor, spelling out some name or word, and taking a photo of it. A DIY black box with a thick white plastic cube inside of it would serve as the end point.