What is wrong with this laser?

This might sound cheesy but to do a bypass of the tailcap to make sure that a switch, keylock or connection is bad or not I have always successfully done it with just a piece of aluminum foil about the size of your thumbnail. This will prove out if the issue is with the tailcap.
Most of my lasers are battery negative end down into the host towards the spring and the battery positive end towards the tailcap. Therefore the tailcap is positive along with the host. The aluminum acts as a jumper from the positive end of the battery directly the the host so the tailcap is completely bypassed. Have the laser pointed in a safe direction of course. Also don't let any aluminum foil get down into the lasers battery tube as it can short out between the host and the negative spring.

Laser Chick said:

This might sound cheesy but to do a bypass of the tailcap to make sure that a switch, keylock or connection is bad or not I have always successfully done it with just a piece of aluminum foil about the size of your thumbnail. This will prove out if the issue is with the tailcap.
Most of my lasers are battery negative end down into the host towards the spring and the battery positive end towards the tailcap. Therefore the tailcap is positive along with the host. The aluminum acts as a jumper from the positive end of the battery directly the the host so the tailcap is completely bypassed. Have the laser pointed in a safe direction of course. Also don't let any aluminum foil get down into the lasers battery tube as it can short out between the host and the negative spring.

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Gozert told me this one was host negative (negative to the tailcap)

Also, I already had it on with a tailcap bypass so I know it's not the tailcap

mercsan said:

Tested 4 different batteries. Same results.

My multimeter sucks and I need to buy a new one, but it read it in the red (replace). I tested all 4 of these batteries in the laser that TheJoker made and they are fine.

Something has to be wrong with the laser

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Gabe you're the man for that video and helping another member out. Rep for you.

MERCSAN, so what did it read? I don't know what you mean by the red. You should have a number of mA. What did it read? What did the Sci Fi laser read and what is that lasers wavelength and power output? When you say you tested all four batteries in the Sci Fi and they were fine, what do you mean?

olympus mons said:

Gabe you're the man for that video and helping another member out. Rep for you.

MERCSAN, so what did it read? I don't know what you mean by the red. You should have a number of mA. What did it read? What did the Sci Fi laser read and what is that lasers wavelength and power output? When you say you tested all four batteries in the Sci Fi and they were fine, what do you mean?

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Gonna pick up a new multimeter as soon as I can.

When I tested them in the Sci-Fi 405nm 437mW, they produced the same output/beam strength as my 18650 panasonic batteries. So I know they are charged for sure (plus, I charged them the night prior getting ready for the Dorcy Jr)

I think I might know where the issue occurs. There's a negative (ground) wired soldered to the ground pin of the diode. I think there's a chance it got messed up during shipping causing the laser to malfunction. I suggest you to try desoldering it and before soldering it back on try connecting the two wires (the spring and the ground wire) to a battery. That I think should work. You may also want to inspect the driver in case one of the wires isn't soldered properly. Don't forget that the spring is + and ground is -

gozert said:

I think I might know where the issue occurs. There's a negative (ground) wired soldered to the ground pin of the diode. I think there's a chance it got messed up during shipping causing the laser to malfunction. I suggest you to try desoldering it and before soldering it back on try connecting the two wires (the spring and the ground wire) to a battery. That I think should work. You may also want to inspect the driver in case one of the wires isn't soldered properly. Don't forget that the spring is + and ground is -

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I don't have an iron right now, but they way you packed it, it's near impossible.

I have a pair of watchmaker glasses and looked at all the solders and they look good.

The probably is since you're not getting the power level advertised by far. But from the pictures nothing is obvious about -why- it malfunctions. Looking at the construction technique and heatsinking provided there is no reason this laser could not perform as advertised.

Unless you can meter currents it would be hard to tell where the problem is. I reckon it is a bad contact -somewhere-, but to figure out where is not that easy by just looking at it. It could be something in the tailcap connection, but also something dislodged in the driver etc.

Sometimes these bad connections cannot be seen with the naked eye at all. Something like a pad on the diver board could have been knocked off in transport, but the component it's connected to just holds in in place mechanically. Issues like that can only be spotted by taking measurements.

As the vendor also built this laser, he can probably inform you of the proper voltages and currents you should measure on/through specific parts of the circuit, making it a lot more easy to find a problem compared to working with a unit you know nothing about.

Multimeter reading -0.65 for every battery im testing

mercsan said:

Multimeter reading -0.65 for every battery im testing

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Is that current draw while the battery is in the laser?

Gabe said:

Is that current draw while the battery is in the laser?

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Yes it is

So drawing 650mA... Don't have anything to compare that to since I've never owned that diode/driver combo. Someone else can though.

Got no clue. All I have is a broken laser and now gozert isn't responding

mercsan said:

Got no clue. All I have is a broken laser and now gozert isn't responding

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You sent me a PM around 7AM my time, it's now 9:30AM. How am I not responding?

Anyways. It's hard for me to decide what I'm gonna do with this. I always package my lasers to prevent any harm done while shipping, and test my laser right before putting it into the box to avoid it possibly not working. The readings show that the driver draws 650mA, which is around what I had DTR set it when I bought it a few months ago. So, it's likely that there's something wrong with the diode.

Since I used to take out my lasers quite often (at least once a week for each laser I had), I doubt the diode was faulty or broken when I still had it. And I even burned a piece of black paper with a friend the day before shipping it to you as he had never seen it before. This means that you either dropped it/did something to it to ruin the duide, or it's an act of god.

I've had plenty of successful sales in the past (20+) and never got a complaint thus far. Most of them were sales to reputable members, because I generally avoid low rep/inactive members. If I had been here to scam others, I would've done so with the >$500 transactions obviously.

I'm still not sure what to think of this, but for now I'm going to leave it how it is and give it some more thought.

This laser needs to be inspected by someone capable of diagnosing the problem. MERCSAN, you need to understand how easy it is for a person new to lasers to damage them in various ways. Battery in the wrong direction is the most common. Then claim they were sent a broken laser. Nobody is saying this is what happened but it certainly is a possibility. It's also a possibility it was damaged in shipping, sounds unlikely with how well Gozert packages his lasers, or the diode just happened to die and it was simply bad luck. So I would recommend you contact DTR and ask him if he will take a look. He would be the best person I can think of because if it is just a bad diode he can replace it for you.

Good advice olympus, get an expert third party opinion from someone who can diagnose, and repair the problem if necessary and agreed upon by all involved.
Assuming this is already in the U.S., shipping would be reasonable, and only take 2-3 days.

gozert said:

I'm still not sure what to think of this, but for now I'm going to leave it how it is and give it some more thought.

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1: Just because I dont build lasers doesn't mean im a retard. I'm 29 and take care of everything I owned. I've only had one broken electronic, which was a GPU that I had to RMA. I didn't drop the laser or the box. Plus, with the pictures that I took and posted here I think that seems very obvious that the laser is in good shape. Though there was a nick on the top when I unpacked it, I'll say the finish was just wearing off since you've had it for a while.

2. If you want to check my eBay profile it is paganizondaf117.

3. The way you packed the laser, I could have kicked the box and im like 99% sure nothing would have happened to anything wrapped the great way that you wrapped it (like 6x layers of bubble wrap) and I am greatful for that.

But not addressing this is not the way to go about this. "Give it more thought" isn't how you keep customers coming back. People say you are a reputable sell, but when you say things like that it makes me wonder.

I've been into lasers seriously for over a year now. To sum everything up, I didn't drop the laser you sold me. I wouldn't have created this thread asking for help if it wasn't malfunctioning the day I received it.