INTRO:

This is a the JetLasers 50mW Ti Lite A pointer. From the thread here. This was received as a review sample, and a soon to be discontinued model. They say the laser did not meet their expectations, and that many improvements were made. More will be learnt about this in the future. Picture quality isn't amazing, I had to size them down a lot to upload them, and it's probably going to chew through my bandwidth as it is, they're good enough though. Anyway, on to the review.

OVERVIEW:

Manufacturer: JetLasers
Host: Ti Lite A
Wavelength: 532nm
Power: 50mW Rated (~90mW stable, peaks of 98mW)
Mode: Perfect TEM00 (pics below)
Beam diameter at aperture: ~1.5mm.
Measured divergence: 1.1 mRad (focusable)
Battery: 1x CR123A or 16340 (does not fit protected cells)
Price: $150USD

PACKAGING AND DELIVERY:

The laser was sent to me via DHL express. Arrived overnight from Hong Kong. Quite impressive.

Once out of the box that was stuffed with bubblewrap and foam, two gift boxes:



They seem a bit small.



Much smaller than I thought it would be.



And everything received.


FIRST IMPRESSIONS:

Holy s*** it's beautiful. Excuse my profanities. :P
It's much smaller than I thought it would be, 114mm long 22mm diameter.
But it's heavy, 130g without the battery.
It doesn't look like your normal aluminium host, looks more of a gun metal colour, because it actually is made of titanium. While titanium isn't the best conductor of heat, it looks simply amazing, and holds it's polish brilliantly.

THE HOST:

The part you've all been waiting for, everyone has seen a green laser before, but not one in a host like this:









The power symbol is laser etched on.

FEATURES AND OPERATION:

JetLasers state that it is waterproof, and I believe them, all threads have o-rings, even the focus ring feels like it is surrounded by rubber, I've had it underwater for about half an hour at one point, no adverse effects. Water easily flicks out of the focusing ring, no little droplets of water get stuck on the lens so the beam quality is back to perfect as soon as it's out of the water. I'm not sure if this is a property of sapphire glass, as the final objective is made of it.







As you can see, o-rings, and the wonderful square threads. I'll get back to that in a second. The battery type and polarity is laser etched on, nice touch.

It is also said to be shockproof, but there's only one way to test that.



It's a laminated wood desk, not particularly soft. I've rolled it down stairs, and dropped it onto carpet from about 1.5m. Still nothing changed.

The laser is focusable, at the furthest extension, the focal point is about 5cm away from the aperture. When focusing to infinity, the best possible divergence is attained at about a quarter turn out from the focus ring screwed all the way down, this is good as it means that the best divergence is not being limited by the ring hitting the host. I will say, the focusing ring is quite stiff though, and difficult to lubricate.





The laser operates in a unique way, the button on the back is actually a momentary button, press to emit light, release to stop. But the laser can be turned on constantly by screwing in the tailcap all the way. This is where the square threads come in, the great square threads are useful, this area of high use; really nice smooth threads, and very easy to get the tailcap on.

I was a bit rough with the focus ring at first, and actually broke it off. The titanium focus ring is just epoxied on the the top of the brass objective holder, and I got to see the sapphire lens when it was off. The glass is a deep black in colour, doesn't look the same as normal glass. It is surrounded by white silicon, which water proofs it. The lens is the final optic in the output path, and the outer side of it is curved, this means to get a straight beam underwater, the focus ring has to be screwed out slightly. I secured the ring back on with epoxy, and pushed in the retaining pin, it won't fall off again. :P



Those marks are not visible in person.

The laser is case positive, but has spring contacts at both ends.



As you can see, fingerprint magnet.

BEAMSHOTS:

Here are a few beamshots I did, none with smoke, just dust in the air and a long exposure. Not amazing, but everyone has seen green beams before.















This one is the dot on a tree about 30m away.





PERFORMANCE:

Beam specs. 1.5mm aperture, 1.1mRad divergence when focused to infinity.

Perfect TEM00:



Defocused on a wall.



Viewing the scatter, the ring around my finger is the round beam itself, as you can see, there is practically no scatter at all. Keep in mind as well, this was done after being underwater multiple times, without cleaning the lens.

The all important power tests. Tests were done starting from ambient, about 22°C. Averaging 90mW, peaking at 98mW, quite nice for a 50mW laser. Tests were over 5 minutes.





The output had no jitter or movement, despite the 10 second intervals. A very stable laser.

Thermal test. Measure with my temperature probe on a fluke 87V, again, 5 minutes.



About 2°C per minute. The heat is concentrated on the ribbed section of the host.

The laser takes a single CR123A or 16340. I've tried batteries all the way from 3V primaries, LiFePO4 cells (~3.3V) and the normal LiCoO2 cells (3.7V). No power change depending on cell. Laser draws ~480mA.

CONCLUSION:

Overall, I'm very very pleased with the laser, definitely the one I'll go to pick up when I want to show them off. Performed well past expectations, and I've decided to ignore the focusing ring fault. It's stronger than it was now anyway. :P

Appearance: 10/10 - Amazing looking, polished very well, highly resistant to scratching
Build Quality: 8/10 - Threads perfect, no machining marks, focusing ring is stiff, focusing ring fell off
Portability: 8/10 - Sure, it's not a keychain, but it'll easily fit in any pocket
Performance: 9/10 - Very stable, 80-100% overspec
"coolness": 10/10 - Unique host, shiny, amazing appearance overall

Overall rating: 9/10 - Not an average, just my opinion

Well, that's it then, hope you enjoyed it. Feel free to ask any questions. I can email you a higher resolution picture if you want.


Thanks,
aXit

very nice review +1

Great laser and great review!! (+1)

Were you told about up to how many feet JETLASERS guarantees the waterproofness of this unit?

great review!!!!! i really like the titanium look...

2 meters underwater for 60 minutes. "IPX-8" standard.

Thanks guys.

What I just saw on Jetlaser´s HP

Well then, that's news to me. I was just going off what I was told.

Thanks for the info!

Oooh, nice review.

I see that the video doesn't work?



I don't think the forum works with the 'new' youtube numbering scheme.

Thanks goninanbl00d. Fixed.

Hi aXit,
Thanks for your review and we appreciate your nice work much. I've got to clarify a little: the hosts(not the layer) are all titanium, while the inside parts I meant is the holders/mounts or some parts in the crystal assembly.

Also a few words for other friends who receive this Lite A version of Green laser pointers:

As the Lite A version has many flaws in both design and features, they are discontinued and the upgraded model will be available soon. We only made a dozen of them and we tested each of them in the very beginning and labelled them with reasonable output power, so we do not make sure each laser can be 40mw or 50mw over spec like this one. It may be just up to the spec. We only make the model up to 200mw due to the small size and waterproof feature.

Have a nice weekend!

Yeah, I removed that from the review after you pointed it out.

Thanks. aXit.

i received this laser for review but i have an idiot cousin who get jealous and breaks it so i cant post a review for it. But i have have to say it is an amazing laser and i recommended JetLasers to anybody they sell the best product and there customer service is top notch you get quick replys and they are really understanding!

You should send your "broken laser" back to Jetlasers!

yea im waiting for there reply on what they want me to do

Out of curiousity... How did they break it? Shockproof, waterproof. The drop tests I've done represent a normal drop that the laser could experience, and it survived fine.

well he went inside the laser and broke a resistor tore off the
pot and ripped the power wire connecing the board to the module so its pretty much dead and he is dead too

Oh My God. He should Join in the "DIY" group here.
I will get back to you via email soon.

wth!!!!!!
lol!!!!! for sure..

Hope it doesn´t turn out that >lnlghost1< only wanted the free laser and never thought about reviewing it. It seems to be one of the "sorry but my dog ate my homework..." excuses. Personally I won´t trust people who joinged some days ago, have no rep... people where LPF isn´t part of their life and don´t care about if LPF-members hate them.

im pretty sure im not becasue if i was i wouldn't have spoke to gray for about 2 hours on how and where to ship the broken laser if you want to can ask gray from jet lasers if you want i have nothing to hide so you can ask me any questions you want too

Yes, it may look 'risky' to send Tommy Le one or two lasers back and forth, but he strikes me as a honest, kind guy though he didnot have any rep yet. Anyway, he needs to be encouraged rather than suspected before he contributes more to this forum. It's not bad to give him some time.

Glad to hear, because we have some serious investigator in here.



Sure its suspect but i think he need another chance.
I cant wait to try these 150mW in Ti host.

You're right! Greg! Good luck.

I have heard that, I was pretty good at damaging lasers .

yea i am pretty new and but im just trying to learn more about laser and get into the hobby