My 1mW laser seems a bit powerful

Hi All,

I bought a few 1mW laser pointers from Ebay to use in my robot as a laser guidance device.

When I point it at a tree over 1 km away I can see the beam and the dot very clearly and brightly at night. This applies for the green and red lasers. Also if I point it at a white wall or carpet 3m away, my eyes flinch at the brightness.

This seems very bright to me, as I was looking for the lowest power laser I could get my hands on.

Am I going crazy or should I bin these laser and keep looking for a lower power? The lasers are going to be in use indoors on my robot, below eye level for humans, but maybe not for my dog.

Thanks,

Jim.

Lasers sold on ebay are quite often overspec (Marked lower power than said to be)

Green lasers though are really visible at night and day since our eyes are most sensitive to this wavelength.

As you can see here, green is the most visible spectrum on the chart.

If you really want to know how powerful your lasers are, you can try sending them to someone local who has a LPM (Laser Power Meter)



On the safe side though, grab your self some laser safety goggles!

As Dan said, Pretty much all of the ones on Ebay are over-spec..

What you could do though is take out the modules and adjust the potentiometer, Less current equals less power basically..

Also I strongly suggest not using them indoors or close quarters, Eye damage isn't a joke :undecided:

Does anyone in Sydney, Australia have a tool to measure the laser output? I wouldn't mind knowing what the power of the ones I bought are.

Try contacting Bobhaha he's in Sydney and should have a LPM (laser power meter)