Do you have to "short" anything when reconnecting a Flexdrive?

Hi all.

I'm about to re-do a recent build to tidy up the internals, and make it perfect, but wondered whether or not I need to "short" anything before reconnecting to the laser diode.

It's a 445 build with the Flexdrive set at 900mA.

With my first build using a DIY DDL driver I had to short the capacitor each time I reconnected the LD, but is this necessary with a Flexdrive, and for future reference, a Microdrive, or Rckstar driver etc...?

Many thanks.

With boost drivers, you don't have to short out anything. If boost driver has residual charge in output capacitor, it means it was working without load. Which means it's dead.

Well, you may just want to slide a screwdriver over two output pads, so if you have a dead driver, that's all that's going to be dead, not the diode also.

But in general, just be careful not to power up the driver without load, then connect it. If you don't power it without diode at all, you don't have to short out the output.

I had a 445 die in my hands because I didn't short the capacitor of the flexdrive. Even though I used a test load there was still charge . Short it to be sure, touch the + and - output for a few secs then connect the LD.

Thanks guys.

I'll be on the safe side and bridge the outputs to make sure.