ebay seller cables-n-peripherals Lightwave Halfnote

Hello, wow its been a long time since I stopped by. Been away from lasers for a while. I just wanted to quickly let everyone know about a bad experience I just had with an ebay seller called "cables-n-peripherals". I won an auction for a lighwave electronics Halfnote 2.5w 532nm laser head but it was a wreck when I received it. And there's no way it could have been shipping damage.

The only thing the ad said (and here's where you may find it on one he still has for sale Lightwave Halfnote Green Laser Module w Heatsink 532nm 2 5W Tested Working | eBay) about its condition is that it was tested-working. When I received mine I was shocked to find the cover over the head loose, Its o'ring gasket sticking out from under it, and something rolling around loose inside the head. I then removed the cover and to my even greater shock: The pump diode, cavity and rod, The crystals and heaters and all the optics were missing. The only thing inside were the optics mounts and a loose screw rolling around.

The seller claims he knew nothing about it being that way. Before I even received it he had assured me via email (ebay messaging) in response to some questions I had for him, that the cover had never been removed and there was no problems with its functionality.

He says he will exchange it or refund my money but not the shipping charges and he expects me to pay to ship it back to him. I really dont understand this and wont speculate though I will say I won the auction for an extremely low amount considering the going price for a good one. He has good feedback and a lot of sales, so I don't know. I currently have a claim open with paypal because I have no intentions of trying another one from him, he's not keeping the shipping charges, and Im not paying to return the carcass to him.

Just wanted to pass that on for what its worth as he still has one up for sale and claims to be in possesion of a lot more.

Sorry for your bad experience, I bought a Halfnote 2.5 watt laser head from him too and had no problems with it. I talked with his technician about their lasers and it became clear they knew little about lasers except to be careful with how much current the laser diode is driven with. However, they should have known better than to ship you that empty platform, I was told at the very least, they made sure they each put out some amount of green light in a very short low current test.

Ask to talk to Harold, their tech they referred me to when I had questions and see how they could have mixed in a empty box with their others. He instructed them how to do a very simple test to see if they put out any amount of light, but I don't know who tested them for output. I was assured if I had any problems they would replace the unit. I believe they have a dozen of them, they offered to sell me their dead ones for 200 each.

Forgive me the 2nd post one right after the other but I want to make sure this is viewed too...

After seeing this thread I became concerned about a second laser head I had bought from this same seller and tested it. The unit also worked as advertised, a Jenoptik Jenlas D2 3 Watt 532nm Green Thin-Disk DPSS Laser Head. The unit is rated at 3 watts nominal CW and 6 watts high output, I ran it up to 25 amps of drive for a few seconds of test each time and it put out the rated power. I would have done longer tests but was manually controlling the TEC's to keep the diode and LBO temperatures within operating range, it can be done manually, but the longer I was running the laser, the faster I had to keep tweaking voltages to keep the temperatures right. I am sure I could have stabilized it after awhile but didn't want to risk loosing control and damaging anything.

I will have to wire in my two TEC controllers soon and do some night time beams into the sky and take photo's to share later.