"Homemade" 7W CO2 laser

Hemlock_Mike · Nov 1, 2009

A high powered portable CO2 is a task because of the input power requirements.
Here's my "starWarz" carbine. About 20 Watts of RF excited CO2 with ZnSe expander.
Just to give you some ideas. Nice work on your 7 watt unit.

HMike

AnselmoFanZero · Nov 1, 2009

Actually it will be a challenge to fill every free mm³ with cooling water ;-)
But thats about it.
I wanna make a ZVS driver which pulls not much more than 50W...cause thats all I need for my 7W tube. Dont wanna have to waste the 3000mAh as heat, generated by resistors.

Regarding the "starWarz" carbine: Looks good! IF there would be a video on utube, I would know...so I guess there is no vid yet? ;-)
Did you make the driver yourself? RF-excited would be cool as well...

Hemlock_Mike · Nov 2, 2009

I've never had time to do videos. The Tube and RG generator came as a set from a vendor here over a year ago. I admit that this draws 12 amps at 32 volts.......... That's a bunch but it's air cooled

HMike

AnselmoFanZero · Nov 2, 2009

You should make a video. Would be cool to see this thing burning...

I thought RF-excited CO2 lasers are more efficient than HV-excited lasers...
32A 12V is alot.

Cyparagon · Nov 2, 2009

Oh no, not by a long shot. My 60W tube only eats 375W or so - 15KV 25mA which makes it about 16% efficient... more than most light bulbs actually. 384W in and 20W out is only 5% efficient. It makes sense because you need to convert electrical power to radio waves and then to atomic excitation in the RF version, and simply excite directly with HV in a HV version. There's an extra step with RF excitation so its inherently less efficient. The downside is of course that mine uses deadly voltage and current, and it must be water cooled.

AnselmoFanZero · Nov 2, 2009

Far beyond portable ;-)
CO2 lasers are very efficient....but I thought RF-lasers are even more eff. than HV-excited CO2 lasers.

By the way: If anyone has a 300mm long 6 or 7 W CO2 laser tube in stock...mail me. ^^

Cyparagon · Nov 2, 2009

More or less... as it is, mine takes two people to move. But it could be made as portable as a telescope provided you're willing to live with an extension cord everywhere you go. All the equipment together weighs only 30 pounds or so.

AnselmoFanZero · Nov 3, 2009

Wow...nice.

Just wondering: Info Unltd has a portable 100W laser in stock...or was this the 20W version??
Would be cool to carry a 20W laser around...but the bigger the tube, the more water you need, the bigger the PSU and so on. Thats why I tought a 7W tube should do the job...just proove of concept. Started yesterday. I have vut out a plexi-center-plate...now its on ^^

DashApple · Nov 3, 2009

Hi

Yer co2 arnt the best for moving as Cyparagon said they are not easy to move , my 60 watt tube is in a box atm , will put it in a case soon i hope , the psu is quite small on mine , well i think small is the word . Water cooling on mine will bee 2 lare PC radiators . i wouldnt mind a 10 watt Hv co2 or rf co2 but the small ones are hard to find. Colling atm on mine is a 1 L bottle of Di water that works for short runs

AnselmoFanZero · Nov 3, 2009

I have a 10W tube which could be mounted on a portable system.
My 7W laser was MADE for a portable system ^^

I will order an even smaller tube with 7W...only 300mm long...I will fill every mm³ of space with water. The tank will be the most complicated component of this project.

Like I said: Its on....another 250 hours and I have a portable laser rifle...

DashApple · Nov 3, 2009

AnselmoFanZero said:
I have a 10W tube which could be mounted on a portable system.
My 7W laser was MADE for a portable system ^^

I will order an even smaller tube with 7W...only 300mm long...I will fill every mm³ of space with water. The tank will be the most complicated component of this project.

Like I said: Its on....another 250 hours and I have a portable laser rifle...

Where do you get your small co2 laser tubes from ?

AnselmoFanZero · Nov 3, 2009

I know 2 guys who can fabricate tubes for me. More expensive than the ebay-stuff, but the quality....you know ;-)

jarrod694 · May 10, 2010

Hi,

As usual, very good work!

I'm trying to build my own CO2 laser from scratch. It's a slow process because I am constructing the actual tube from scratch. I have some mirrors to use, one of which has a hole through which to pass the output beam:

To seal this hole, I am experimenting with homemade rock salt windows (an art I am a long way from perfecting, as you can see below).

AnselmoFanZero · May 10, 2010

Thank you Jarrod.
Nice pics! But how do you wanna make a tube from scratch? Quarz-glass for the inner tube and plexi for the outer tube?
Would be a flowing-gas laser-tube right?

A TEA CO2 laser would be kinda cool!

Cyparagon · May 10, 2010

That might be a record for smallest CO2 beam. Where did you get that measurement from? And since when do functional mirrors have holes in them?

AnselmoFanZero · May 10, 2010

Its called a poor mans CO2 laser. Dont know about beam quality...divergence should be horrible...

"Homemade" 7W CO2 laser

Hemlock_Mike

0

AnselmoFanZero

0

Hemlock_Mike

0

AnselmoFanZero

0

Cyparagon

0

AnselmoFanZero

0

Cyparagon

0

AnselmoFanZero

0

DashApple

0

AnselmoFanZero

0

DashApple

0

AnselmoFanZero

0

jarrod694

0

AnselmoFanZero

0

Cyparagon

0

AnselmoFanZero

0

Online statistics

Forum statistics

Share this page