grainde
0
- Joined
- Jan 29, 2012
- Messages
- 3,163
- Points
- 113
Well I couldnt wait to share this little pocket burner with you. Its nearly 2 am and Im still writing...:can:
Some time ago I decided to scavenge the diodes from an old Dell laptop 4x DVD burner. There were only 2 diodes inside; one which looked like a bar with a rectangular heatsink and the other, an open can 3.8 mm red. After the extraction I put the diode aside and forgot about it.
About a week ago I found an old incandescent key chain flashlight and whilst messing around with it I discovered it was exactly the right size for a copper module! The quest for the ultimate mini burner had begun!! :eg:
As the internal diameter was only 10 mm and depth for the driver was 5 mm there was no way I could fit a standard driver in the space between the module and the battery. So in the end I decided to try and make my own albeit extremely simple driver board. I removed an AMC chip (350 mA) from a spare AMC board and, after consulting the spec sheet, wired up a test, or proof of principal driver.
Amazingly this worked without blowing the diode! I wasnt actually sure what this diode was, how powerful, or even what the pin outs were, so I guessed...fortunately it wanted to live!:tinfoil:
Taking a very old piece of circuit board, I filed it down to size and transferred the chip and cap to it along with the wires. I used a dremel to remove the anodizing inside the tube and soldered a bit of wire over the edge of the board to pic up the negative.
After carefully pressing the board into the host I used super glue to fix it in place and then added a thin layer of artic alumina around the rim where the module sits. I let this almost set before adding a little more paste and gluing the module down. This was done to avoid shorts, as in this instance, and most cases with red diodes, it was case negative. The driver being an AMC based one was continuous positive. Not a good mix for your diode if its not isolated!
Finally I attached the head with arctic alumina to help transfer the heat away from the module and make sure it was isolated from the host. After testing to make sure the module was properly isolated I added an acrylic lens, focus adapter and battery. A new mini laser was born...:wave:
This is a pic of the completed laser. Youll notice that the rear cap isnt screwed down completely an this is actually how you turn the laser on and off, as its too small to have a switch! There is an O-ring which provides enough resistance to hold the laser body and tail cap together when partially unscrewed. To turn on, it just needs to be screwed down tight.
Here Ive tried to show a size comparison of the laser and 10440 battery against an 18650!
and here I put a couple of other lasers into the pic for a size comparison, yes I had to add the Crelant!
The laser outputs a whopping 240 mW on my LB 2.5 W LPM, which is really incredible for something this size. The module used was of course copper and the heat transfer works well. Here the laser was run for around a minute and it was beginning to get warm. Id say the run time was 1.5 mins on 2 mins off.
So on to the beam shots! Unfortunately Im limited to the kitchen for my pics which is rather white and unfriendly for laser photos, but in the end a couple came out ok.
The last ones are the beam out of the window. The divergence on this laser is excellent and Im incredibly happy with it!
Thanks for watching and hope you enjoyed the write up, as much as I did the build! :beer:
Some time ago I decided to scavenge the diodes from an old Dell laptop 4x DVD burner. There were only 2 diodes inside; one which looked like a bar with a rectangular heatsink and the other, an open can 3.8 mm red. After the extraction I put the diode aside and forgot about it.
About a week ago I found an old incandescent key chain flashlight and whilst messing around with it I discovered it was exactly the right size for a copper module! The quest for the ultimate mini burner had begun!! :eg:
As the internal diameter was only 10 mm and depth for the driver was 5 mm there was no way I could fit a standard driver in the space between the module and the battery. So in the end I decided to try and make my own albeit extremely simple driver board. I removed an AMC chip (350 mA) from a spare AMC board and, after consulting the spec sheet, wired up a test, or proof of principal driver.
Amazingly this worked without blowing the diode! I wasnt actually sure what this diode was, how powerful, or even what the pin outs were, so I guessed...fortunately it wanted to live!:tinfoil:
Taking a very old piece of circuit board, I filed it down to size and transferred the chip and cap to it along with the wires. I used a dremel to remove the anodizing inside the tube and soldered a bit of wire over the edge of the board to pic up the negative.
After carefully pressing the board into the host I used super glue to fix it in place and then added a thin layer of artic alumina around the rim where the module sits. I let this almost set before adding a little more paste and gluing the module down. This was done to avoid shorts, as in this instance, and most cases with red diodes, it was case negative. The driver being an AMC based one was continuous positive. Not a good mix for your diode if its not isolated!
Finally I attached the head with arctic alumina to help transfer the heat away from the module and make sure it was isolated from the host. After testing to make sure the module was properly isolated I added an acrylic lens, focus adapter and battery. A new mini laser was born...:wave:
This is a pic of the completed laser. Youll notice that the rear cap isnt screwed down completely an this is actually how you turn the laser on and off, as its too small to have a switch! There is an O-ring which provides enough resistance to hold the laser body and tail cap together when partially unscrewed. To turn on, it just needs to be screwed down tight.
Here Ive tried to show a size comparison of the laser and 10440 battery against an 18650!
and here I put a couple of other lasers into the pic for a size comparison, yes I had to add the Crelant!
The laser outputs a whopping 240 mW on my LB 2.5 W LPM, which is really incredible for something this size. The module used was of course copper and the heat transfer works well. Here the laser was run for around a minute and it was beginning to get warm. Id say the run time was 1.5 mins on 2 mins off.
So on to the beam shots! Unfortunately Im limited to the kitchen for my pics which is rather white and unfriendly for laser photos, but in the end a couple came out ok.
The last ones are the beam out of the window. The divergence on this laser is excellent and Im incredibly happy with it!
Thanks for watching and hope you enjoyed the write up, as much as I did the build!
:beer:
Last edited:
102(1000P), 222(2200P), 332(3300P), 682(6800P), 103(0.01UF), 472(4.7NF), 333(0.33UF), 473(0.047UF), 683(0.068UF), 104(0.1UF) / 152, 222, 332, 472, 103, 153, 223, 473, 683, 104)
.
