need advice on buying ir laser

where should i go to get a nice, high quality, burning ir laser for around 100-200 bucks?

You can try making your own. In terms of low-cost high quality IR burning lasers I think I do a pretty good job but I don't have anything THAT cheap. Mostly because I require you to buy goggles in a package with my IR lasers, and good goggles can easily run upwards of $200-300 by themselves.

If you want to be using IR for burning, goggles are a must IMO. Unfortunately, that means you'll probably need to extend your budget by $100 or so to also get a decent IR laser. The way I see it though, if you cant afford goggles, you can't afford a burning laser. Sorry!

(I COULD sell you a decent IR laser in the $100-200 price range but you'd need to get protection goggles too)


The other route would be to make something yourself. You won't get something nice, ready to go, and easy to use as if you bought a ready-made unit, but you'll learn a lot more DIYing it. You can get IR diodes dirt cheap off the web, and I even have some 260mW 978nm 5.6mm cans I could sell.

That's only going to work if you make your own. Or get pseudo drunk.

lol. i have some prior know how about diy lasers, i just finished my second 200 mw red. would i be able to use the LM317 circuit with it? and what would i use to collimate and focus the beam?

Cyparagon said:

That's only going to work if you make your own. Or get pseudo drunk.

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LOL!

lasercricker said:

lol. i have some prior know how about diy lasers, i just finished my second 200 mw red. would i be able to use the LM317 circuit with it? and what would i use to collimate and focus the beam?

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Well, its a bit of a different beast since you'd be dealing with a multi-mode invisible or nearly invisible diode. If you have a 5.6mm can, you can stick it in an AixiZ module as long as you're careful to not let it overheat. LM317 current regulator could be configured, although the current draw/operating voltage is obviously different.

Getting it to a beam though can be a pain in the ass though because we're talking a multi mode diode. If you collimate the beam to 2mm diameter like you usually do in an aixiz module, you're gunna have divergence in the 10mRad range. If you just wanna focus it for burning though, just use a big magnifying glass.