You are probably better off with it @ 1050mA than going to 1.4A. I am not sure I would say that is a safe current yet either. I currently recommend 750mA on the 300mW and 1A on the 500mW but it is up to you how far you want to push it. You might even loose visual brightness and some stability that high plus I assume this is not a going to be the burner of your collection so I really don't see a need to crank it up. But that is just my two cents.

I'm not having any luck with that driver above. I assume it is pretty basic...

Center is battery + outer ring is battery -

Running the + and - on the populated side to the Jufran test load with 4 diodes jimpered.

There is a solder blob on the populated side of the board where they soldered the leads, it could be bridging something it shouldn't.


Exactly what I was looking for DTR, thanks!

That was my concern, that turning it up wouldn't result in that much increase in perceived brightness since the wavelength was climbing.

^ Give us some pics to look at, maybe we can figure it out. Also the test load might be too high, try setting to 2 diodes. (I'm assuming you are using one cell)

I would say go for 1050. As DTR said its not going be your big burner so you should go for wavelength. I love my little jayrob cr2 with a 300mw 635 diode at 700ma from a custom 2 AMC7135 board. Even in such a small host it has a great duty cycle.

My new build is runing at 1400ma and has peaked at 1.15W. I did throw 1900ma at it on the benchtop at one time and it survived but I dont think I would expect any kind of life out of it at that current.

I'm thinking about using this...

3V~8.4V 5W Cree 5-Mode Circuit Board for Flashlights (16.8mm*6.3mm) - Worldwide Free Shipping - DX

It is very stable at 1.2A.

I'm not seeing anything ugly and this looks like a decent compromise on power and safety.

I'm assuming this is a buck driver since it will run off 8.4v. I scoped it at 4.2v. I'll try it with two Li-ion batteries and see if it is any different.

I haven't seen my scope keep re-trigger over and over like this on a driver before.


Here it is with two AW IMR 16340's - seems much dirtier when running off of 8.4v vs 4.2v

Same behavior with the constant re-arming of the trigger.


Untitled by tsteele93, on Flickr

Tom,

I keep seeing you are using DC coupling...

If you are looking for the ripple current you must switch to the AC coupling.
AC coupling eliminates all of the DC signal and shows only the ripple.

If you are looking for something else nevermind then

Well since I now have an LPM I can tell you my 500mW diode is now putting out about 4mW at 1.4A.

Somewhere along the line I fried it. I didn't think it was very bright from the start, and I was very careful with the current on the lab supply and had it well heat sinked. It must be a genuine 500mW diode as its still working fine at 1.4A - just very low output

AUS I would re-check your driver. What kind of driver are you using? Then if you have another lower ma driver try that. If you are sure you fried it, maybe it is salvageable Talk to JULSE aka wanaburn about it he may be able to repair your diode he is working on my first mits500 for me atm because I killed it when it was hooked up to my benchtop PSU I accidentally hit the ma/A button and fried the leads. I still havent got it back but he thinks it looks promising. Very tedious work I would think I wouldnt have steady enough hands to solder inside diodes!

Also test the diode just conecting leads to the driver you may have a bad ground to the - of the battery I have that problem with a couple builds where a bad ground can make the diode not work proper I tighten it up sand off the anodization etc to make sure the - connects well.

Maybe you might want to rethink the 1400ma Tom I know you lost a few diodes lately. It is quite possible that only some of these diodes can take it others may be more sensitive.

Edit: that is the trigger menu, it looks like the scope is in AC mode, I think that it is just triggering on a certain dc current.

That could be why it was constantly retriggering though. I'll try setting it to AC as well and see what happens.

I had planned on building this last night, but I am on vacation and at my parents house near the beach. I keep finding little things I forgot. Like my two DIODE PRESSES! Argh.

For the good order these 500mW diode dims when they are overdriven beyond the maximum or just goes LED ?

mine went dead. no light. DEAD

Mine still lases, from about 100mA up to 1.4A, but only at low power for the whole range. I have removed the laser, heatsink, and leads and taken the driver off. I was using an AMC7135 LED driver board from flea-bay.

When I first got it I ran it up with a heatsink very slowly on a lab supply with an ammeter and stopped at 1.4A. The diode is pressed into the 1" diameter heatsink and has heat transfer compound on it (can't remember if its silicone or beryllium oxide but it wasn't the stuff that goes hard). I remember I got a dab on the diode at the time but wiped it off with a cloth. I'll check it on a bench supply tonight and do a power profile on it if i bget time (I have visitors coming over soon).

I just got done with mine. I went ahead and used this driver 3V~8.4V 5W Cree 5-Mode Circuit Board for Flashlights (16.8mm*6.3mm) - Worldwide Free Shipping - DX in boost mode and was very underwhelmed to get 50mW with LAZEERER's corrective optics.

I turned it off and wondered what I had done wrong.

I turned it back on and it started blinking...

Oh yeah, modes!

I cycled back to full power and got around 525mW using LAZEERER's corrective optics. I was still disappointed in the output so I dug out a 650 G-1 and whammo - 830mW!

I would like to note that I am running in boost mode, after testing the driver a few posts back it seemed much cleaner in boost than buck mode for some reason.

I took it outside and the output is impressive, but the beam spec is by far the WORST of any laser I own. LAZEERER's optics do an amazing job of taming the beam, at the expense (of course) of power. His optics don't make it a DOT but with his optics, you end up better than a 445 beam, in my opinion. But you take that power hit!

In the end, you have to decide whether you want a horribly winged dot or a lower output. There is no free lunch.

On one hand 525mW is a nice red laser, but on the other hand I can get that power way cheaper with a 300mW 635 cranked up (see my sig) and if you are just doing a laser show in the sky then power is more important than the dot...

I'm very happy with the LAZEERER optics and am not planning on taking him up on his return policy (which is very generous) but I think that I will just keep that lens with the laser so I can switch to whichever I want as the need arises.

I have the diode in an AnthoT copper module in a custom HUNK of copper heat sink in one of LAZEERER's fat boy bodies. It basically should have an unlimited duty cycle. No, it's not for sale!

I'll post some pics tomorrow. I was just excited to have done a successful build. It has been a little while.

Next up, I need to have a 405nm back in the stable, if the new Elasti-Drive™ is stable, I'll be doing that this week with a 510mA driver and we will see how it turns out!

Have you made a new laser driver? Is there a thread, because I searched and got no results.

Let's just say something is in development right now, in the testing stages. It looks very promising. And to be fair, I have had a very secondary role in development - somewhat of a venture capitalist and a second set of eyes, as well as a troubleshooter and devil's advocate. But the vast majority of the credit will go to my partner when we are ready to start production.

Honestly, right now it is still in testing stages and I don't want to make too much of it yet. I was really just teasing a little and didn't expect anyone to make much of it. I should have known better!

Sounds cool, cant wait to see it! Who is the partner?

LeQuack... He has amazed me with some of the revisions. He came up with one idea that cut the parts count and space considerably by changing one component and it didn't even drive up price more than a few cents (other than the old ones that we had already bought-lol). We have a working board now, except the USPS squished the inductor and I need to replace it. If it looks good on the scope then we will be looking at being very close. But it is a "fixed with wire" pcb. The revisions to fix that on the pcb are at dorkbot now.

And we currently have three versions, "no rev polarity protection", "rev polarity protection" and "round w rev polarity protection" boards in the works. I prefer protected as I am the king of "putting batteries in backwards."

We haven't added RHD magic to the design though.

Rounds are the farthest behind right now, and kind of frigging expensive compared to rectangle.

Still a lot of testing to be done, as I'm sure YOU are aware. Once we get the next round of PCBs in from osh park/dorkbot we will know a lot more. Plus I need to work on my reflow skills. I had one chip keep rotating on me in my uber expensive $3.50 Goodwill store 1000w reflow oven. (aka toaster oven)

It is a fun, but slow, process. I wish we could get PCBs made faster.

Glad you Like the Lens.

Just now Seeing this post.

Yeah the Power loss compare to A G1 lens is even more. with an Axiz Lens your looking at only a ~50-70mW loss in power ever 400mW.

I did the same for a while i switch lenses back and forth but over time and Iam not just saying this because its my lens for anyone that reads this But over time i started to leave my lens in more because i was over the power thing. The beam was just to bad with a G lens for my liking. Though if you want the power its the only way to go.

I think your really running this build on the supper safe side. 1W is IMO OK to be run on these 500mW diode. If you where to use my lens with it doing 1W with the G lens then you should be up ~750mW-800mW with my lens.

As for WL shift again i think this is way overlooked by alot of us. You will shift with Higher currant but NOT as Much Shift as running your laser hot. Increasing the currant from where you are now to 1W will not make you shift in WL more then a couple nm if that. Running your laser HOT will make it shift double that.
Plus at this power you cant notice it. Once these diodes warm up even a little they are near >640nm.

If you really want to see 635nm then Chill it. I can tell you then is the only time you will notice a difference is color. You wont notice a difference in color but just not turning the currant up as high. Even Chilling it, its almost the same.

I cant wait to see the picture of the Big Boy build you did. I love that host.

How is this lense compare to a 3 element? I baught 3 somewhere and they put out alot nicer beam but there power is poor.

You bought 3 of what lens somewhere.?

An Aixiz Lens Is similar to what an Aixiz Acrylic lens beam looks like.


Here is a picture of the beam different between a standard Aixiz Acrylic which is on top and my lens which is on the bottom


THe Aixiz Lens puts Out a Couple millimeters better then an Acrylic.


You can see the comparison here with an Aixiz Acrylic lens to my lens:
It is Here.!!!!! 300mW "635nm" Mitsubishi.....

I baught 3 - 3element glass lenses. They seem to put out alot better dot than the aixis coated glass for 635. I honestly dont remember where I got them from. I dont think there coated they look very clear (I dont see any reflected color blue gold red) I'll do some beamshots later when I get a chance. Maybe there the same as the aixis coated glass lenses without a coating I dont know. I dont use the acrylic lenses in anything I think I have about 20 of them now. I figured they would melt on just about anything.