SSY 1's Recently?

Ulao ----
I'll try to explain the head, your photo 2 here.

Just a note, if this is above your head, you shouldn't be working with this. The voltage is high on the capacitors and the laser output REQUIRES eye safety. Please don't ask questions indicating that you aren't educated........

Picture 2: This picture shows the actual Nd:Yag head. The black shroud is the HR end of the laser and the output end has a "nipple" which houses a diverging lens plus a very efficient low pass filter (needed for military purposes!). These can be removed if you have the knowledge and tools.

3 --- Wires D: These are the wires directly connected to the flash tube. Connect the RED to E1 and the black to E2. Simple. This puts the coil in series with the flash circuit.
4: --- Wires C: These wires are for the triggering of the tube. There are several ways to connect these wires but you will need a .022 to .047 mFd cap and a resistor of about 300K to 500K ohm plus a PB grounding switch to dump the cap. The internet has many pages showing how to connect this common circuit. Keep Black wire - as common and Red as + Hot.

PLEASE be careful with this type of laser.

HMike

Note: Most of these heads include a liquid dye cell Q switch. This will increase Peak power.

Thanks for this info Mike. That makes it easier to find as it is not on Sam's site.
Maybe we can get the info to Sam & he'll post it.

Ulao ----
I got my non-contact power meter built using the 0.030" thick carbon disk (Post 192).
I used your formulas plus a couple assumptions on this. I read 0.8 Deg F temp rise
a couple times - single pulse.



Using the PFN plus 50 mFd electrolytic "helper" cap at 550 volts, it looks like 30 mJ
output but I have nothing for calibration of this. With no lens, I still ablate a little carbon.
I gotta do some thinking here but it appears to work.
HMike

Late update: Using a 900 mW blue laser on this for a "manual" 1 second This appears to read high needing an
~60% multiplier. This makes my original reading --- 30 mJ x 60% = 18 mJ which is likely a little closer to reality.

Mike.
I like your device, especially that it reads with .1 f precision. that's more like .055 C.
If you are ablating try defocusing to cover a larger area.
Remember that you are dealing with differential measurements here so a lot of considerations for absolute measurements don't affect your measurements.
I might look into acquiring one of these thermometers myself because it's hard to get that kind of precision with a thermocouple.
I think you is onto somethin here young man.

Welllll .... 0.1 Deg "precision" for $16 !!!!!
It will also read in Deg C. I ordered another for cooking !!!
HMike

Here's a nice pic from my archives of a SSY1 breakin air.

I just posted a video about my home built LIBS system on YouTube it's at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZzBSCrS8FAY

Hemlock Mike,
You asked if anyone could translate the label on the side of the sissy2 pfn.
Well it is roughly Caution High Tension. Remember Hebrew reads from right to left and uses no vowels. I've got the words in reverse order and cannot make them come out right but you can copy the following Hebrew and paste it into Google Translate you will get something like "High tension with permissibility" and if you look up the left most word it will also translate as "caution" מתח גבוה להתרות

Just an update here. I have 3 of these "SSY-2" heads. Two have Q cells
but one arrived with an unusual slanted plano optic in place of the Q.
It never seemed to have the power of the Q'ed ones so I took it apart to
install a larger flash tube. Needless to say, I screwed the alignment in spite
of witness marks and realignment is proving to be trouble.
I have now removed the slant optic trying to make this an OC -- Rod -- HR
cavity but so far, no go. The other two heads lase but not with air plasma. -- yet
HMike

Thanx Mike appreciate the update. Still have not gotten round to working on mine, still working on chipmunk damage.

Joule input is a bit confusing on these heads.

1 - Using 50 mFd of electrolytic Photo flash caps, I see inefficiencies as expected
with higher ERC caps. 50 mFd charged to 480 VDC is 5.76 Joules -- BUT -- after the
discharge, there is 65 volts left in the caps when the arc quenches indicating only
4.3 Joules was used in the arc.

2 - Using the LOW ERC PFN network, 26 mFd @ 500 VDC = 3.25 Joules. But with these mylar caps, the remaining voltage is only 9 volts indicating greater dump efficiency.

This may be why camera flash tubes can sustain higher calculated input power but the gross light output may not be most efficient for laser cavity pumping.

HMike

Interesting. Good work, I hadn't thought of that.

Ulao - John------
You might want to ask "Flaminpyro" about
your needs. I can only help a little.
HMike