For my second attempt at a lab laser I stepped it up a notch. This lab style heatsink is huge and looks the part. Every surface has been machined and the centerpiece is a 3/4" copper block which fits the aixiz module and provides extra cooling.
Some basic progress pictures:
Surfaces all machined square and painted with layout dye.
Cutting...
Machining the fins...
Onwards to the copper, its harder to machine than aluminum but nothing too troublesome.
The finished heatsink:
All parts loosely press fit and are held together by a single set screw.
Assembled.
I put it together with a blu-ray diode and some artic silver. Only running at 140mA since I want to keep this diode for a while with 100% duty cycle. I would stress test it but I only have a few diodes and is there really a question about the performance of a solid copper/aluminum block?
One of the modules is a 5mW red, two are blu-rays and one is empty. :'( I better buy more sleds before I go through withdrawal.
The following experiment doesn't really deserve a full thread of its own IMO so I will tack it on the bottom here. Playing around with a beamsplitter just to see how hard it really is to combine two different lasers.
The setup, a beam splitter from a leftover sled on top of a pile of post-it notes (perfect for adjusting height) and a pair of lasers. (Excuse the blue layout dye, I don't like working with lacquer remover when I can avoid it).
The path of the green laser. Because the green is unpolarized it splits approximately 50-50.
Blu-ray, polarized so it transmits almost completely. The beam diameter is a touch larger than the cube though.
And together. If you look closely you can see the thin green beam right in the center of the violet beam. The camera is far more discerning than the eye, this was not noticeable in person.
Getting a good beamshot was hard because the camera weighs violet so much more heavily than our eyes. The beam was a nice blue/aqua color, however unlike a pure blue the dot color changes significantly depending on the fluorescence of the material in question.
This experiment wasn't that hard to set up and was a lot of fun, if I had a high powered red I would have done yellow as well. My next project will be to build a small self contained module with screws to align two modules a mirror and a beam splitter. I've drawn up a plan but I need to pick up some screws and taps before I can begin.
And that's all for today. I will probbably end up selling/trading some stuff for other laser related gear since I need my hobbies to be at least somewhat self-supporting. I am also working on picking up the tooling required to make a solid copper direct-contact heatsink. I'm sure there will be interest in solid copper modules with the same dimensions as the aixiz module.
Some basic progress pictures:
Surfaces all machined square and painted with layout dye.
Cutting...
Machining the fins...
Onwards to the copper, its harder to machine than aluminum but nothing too troublesome.
The finished heatsink:
All parts loosely press fit and are held together by a single set screw.
Assembled.
I put it together with a blu-ray diode and some artic silver. Only running at 140mA since I want to keep this diode for a while with 100% duty cycle. I would stress test it but I only have a few diodes and is there really a question about the performance of a solid copper/aluminum block?
One of the modules is a 5mW red, two are blu-rays and one is empty. :'( I better buy more sleds before I go through withdrawal.
The following experiment doesn't really deserve a full thread of its own IMO so I will tack it on the bottom here. Playing around with a beamsplitter just to see how hard it really is to combine two different lasers.
The setup, a beam splitter from a leftover sled on top of a pile of post-it notes (perfect for adjusting height) and a pair of lasers. (Excuse the blue layout dye, I don't like working with lacquer remover when I can avoid it).
The path of the green laser. Because the green is unpolarized it splits approximately 50-50.
Blu-ray, polarized so it transmits almost completely. The beam diameter is a touch larger than the cube though.
And together. If you look closely you can see the thin green beam right in the center of the violet beam. The camera is far more discerning than the eye, this was not noticeable in person.
Getting a good beamshot was hard because the camera weighs violet so much more heavily than our eyes. The beam was a nice blue/aqua color, however unlike a pure blue the dot color changes significantly depending on the fluorescence of the material in question.
This experiment wasn't that hard to set up and was a lot of fun, if I had a high powered red I would have done yellow as well. My next project will be to build a small self contained module with screws to align two modules a mirror and a beam splitter. I've drawn up a plan but I need to pick up some screws and taps before I can begin.
And that's all for today. I will probbably end up selling/trading some stuff for other laser related gear since I need my hobbies to be at least somewhat self-supporting. I am also working on picking up the tooling required to make a solid copper direct-contact heatsink. I'm sure there will be interest in solid copper modules with the same dimensions as the aixiz module.