frustrated, what am I doing wrong?

I think we need to bust Kipkay. Direct drive is dangerous

Ok, morning update. Here are some setup pictures as requested. I doubled checked my circuit and did a test load. I have it built on a breadboard for now until I find the right resistor I want. Currently running a 6 ohm resistor to obtain 230mA.

How often do you need to hear it?
Your driver setup is fine, your diode is busted!

anselm said:

How often do you need to hear it?
Your driver setup is fine, your diode is busted!

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Your comments arent necessary. If you would read earlier in the thread, somone wanted detailed pics of how things were setup. I wasnt asking if it looked ok.

anyone help me?

richard86 said:

anyone help me?

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Well first off, you didn't give any real information about your problem.. and yes you'll need a lens to get a beam..

Secondly.. you stated you wanted to buy a 2W laser... then admitted to lasing aircraft in the same post... The last part alone is enough to make most people here have nothing to do with you.

@Eudaimonium
I always use new batteries on it, and it works fine
I know what you mean't but.. it was just a hope to see if the driver was blown. I never blown my reddie like this..
Np, I'll not recommend it (I just did it here), as I know it is wrong. Bad idea of my part.

Leodahsan said:

@Eudaimonium
I always use new batteries on it, and it works fine
I know what you mean't but.. it was just a hope to see if the driver was blown. I never blown my reddie like this..
Np, I'll not recommend it (I just did it here), as I know it is wrong. Bad idea of my part.

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Quite interesting...

What kind of host are you using, what kind of diode is it, and what kind of batteries? Is there any additional resistance between the batteries and the diode? If not, the diode would never survive two fresh alkalines.

@Eudaimonium
Sounds wrong to answer that, it would make users more confident to direct drive.

It actually was my first laser. Before I saw kipkay, LPF or even knowing that "green and blue" lasers actually EXISTS. The diode was on the sled, I soldered + and - (trying it with 3v wires) and it worked with two cells.

After sometime, I was annoyed with the cells discharging, and soldered a socket where I'd put my phone cell (3.6v charged 3.2v nominal) and it got much stronger. It worked like a charm but it was heating the entire sled after 3~5 minutes of use (lol) so I desoldered and put some 2*aa socket. The long runtimes were very good to me.

PS: on the same sled I got the IR diode with the output coupled with the RED diode output. So I maked a key where I could choose between the diodes (both direct drove). Teh crap was that the IR diode could'n survive 3v, only 2.4v rechargeable. So only the red is alive ATM.
Both diodes (IR and RED) in the same place made a great burner (with lenses). I think it was around 50mW red and 50mW IR. Didn't seem to lose power by the time.

edit: No resistance

I actually like what Kipkay did. My hope is that it dissuaded a lot of would-be idiots who won't do any research and just want a "burning laser" from continuing in their endeavor.

Bionic-Badger said:

I actually like what Kipkay did. My hope is that it dissuaded a lot of would-be idiots who won't do any research and just want a "burning laser" from continuing in their endeavor.

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Truth there, if there would be a complete and easy tutorial on the internet, world would not have a country WITHOUT some form of laser ban.

StyroPyro is doing it in much better way, IMHO. If you know what you're doing, he's guiding you, if you don't - you won't get it either. He also promotes a lot of laser safety goggles and stuff.

Leo, stop using a kipkay driver...It will die.

And he said it had a dim red light, i read most of the posts but does anyone know if he accidently extracted the IR diode?

A possibility, yes. I do not see a small circular extrusion of the diode's base where the pins are, which most red diodes have.

It would be nice if OP could check out what is the color of the window's reflection on the diode, it would tell us a lot.

@TTerbo
I don't 'use' a kipkay driver for my builds.. just in that reddie..
to remember 'old times' where I did it myself and feeled like.. dunno, perfect sensation.
(Thats what lasers do with people hahah)...
The laser itself is abandoned in a box I think. I glued the sled to the 2*aa cell socket even not using it.

@Eudaimonium & TTerbo
He could say where he attached the wires.. IR diode pinout =/= Red diode pinout

Not entirely true.
Some IR diodes use the same pin out as a red diode, where as some are case positive.

Indeed, I once witnessed a case NEGATIVE 808nm pump diode, it was from a small 1x AAA "20mW" green laser you can purchase on DX and other generic sites. I was astonished. My friend said he left the battery inside the laser when he shipped the laser to me (my task was to replace the inner driver to make it work on one lithium ion battery, saves money to have rechargeables).

So I take it out of the box, and press the button and see it shines (beam a little off center but OK), and I take out the battery and I could not believe it was inserted case negative way.

I thought, perhaps the diode is insulated from host somehow... but nope, taking it apart further proved it was case negative. Made my job easier, just made a LM1117 driver, and it worked on 10440 battery no problems. Only started dimming at aproximately 3.5 V of battery voltage, so battery is safe from over discharge.

The unit also had an actual boost converter circuit. And I was amazed of the lasing threshold of the whole unit too, it didn't start giving off green light until 200mA.

Must've sucked quite some currents from poor AAA battery.