Hello all. My name is Jeremy. I am a powertrain engineer for chrysler in michigan. I have been tinkering with things all my life but generally I have stuck with things of a mechanical nature. Truth be told, anything involving circuitry/electronic devices I have tended to shy away from. I can rebuild a motor no problem but ask me to wire something up, forget about it. With this said, I have never really looked into the world of lasers because they involve diodes, heat sinks, etc...I have decided to change a lot of things in my life and that includes going head first into all the things I would have never thought about attempting in the past.

After doing some research on the internet (mostly here in LPF) I am starting to understand the basics of laser function and terminology. I have always been very mechanically inclined so I feel that I will know just enough to be dangerous in no time.

I have a few no name 5 mW 532 nm and 445 nm lasers. I also have my first class IV on order from Lazerer. I ordered the 445 nm 1W Rifle V2. My hope was to get a 532 nm Rifle laser but they were out of stock. This brings me to my question. What do you all use your lasers for? Astronomy? Buring everyday objects? Let me know. I'm interested in hearing what these wonderful devices can be used for

Spacecowboy

There are wonderful devices .. why is it not enough ?
Honestly, laser pointers above 5mW are useless, class 4 laser pointers doubly so. I know no reasonable use for them. But they are cool.

really only useful for burning things

they're kinda like guns, or a pocket flamethrower

Hello Spacecowboy,
welcome to LPF,
some people have used them for soldering, I briefly tried to solder yet had no success
I have used a 445nm to blast fruit flies on my ceiling, goggles are a necessity.

I use my lasers at parties and for dancing, after I put them on gloves: trinaryproducts.com

Has anyone attempted to light Visco fuse with a laser? It comes in a variety of colors, my guess is that it could be possible with a darker colored fuse but I know some people have difficulty lighting candle wicks. Not sure if this would hold true for the Visco as well...

yyeeeeah boyeee! fireworks fuses are super easy to light with lasers and they provide a "safer" alternative to getting right up and lighting them. takes a second to set up, but once you have the right focus and preferably a tripod, you can set off all sorts of fused objects (bottle rockets, mortars, dynamite, you name it). Also due to the black threads of gunpowder in the fuse, pretty much any color laser(or even IR) will set them off no problem with the right amount of power

They are just neat really, impressive and something just nice to own. And lighting fuses is the only real use for me, that and admiring the beam

Art and experimental/optical photography. Welcome to LPF