Power levels of diodes

So how does this work? What determines the effective "wattage" output of a diode (or laser)? Does it work differently for different wavelengths of light? ie. Possible to do a 10W red, or is there a diode limitation? How big (physically) can diodes get?

Sorry, just curious and want to learn about this.

(EDIT: Also, which wavelength would be most visible at 1W?)

(EDIT2: Do 10W diodes even exist? : o )

(EDIT3: Smilies on this board suck. : o =! = : ) )

BlueToast said:

So how does this work? What determines the effective "wattage" output of a diode (or laser)? Does it work differently for different wavelengths of light? ie. Possible to do a 10W red, or is there a diode limitation? How big (physically) can diodes get?

Sorry, just curious and want to learn about this.

(EDIT: Also, which wavelength would be most visible at 1W?)

(EDIT2: Do 10W diodes even exist? )

Click to expand...

I'm going to try and answer your questions the best I can with my limited knowledge, so hopefully some veterans will step in and correct me if I'm incorrect:

Wattage is simply the amount of current going through the diode. Diodes will be rated for a certain amount of wattage based on things like the materials they're made up of, effective operating temperature, etc.

Different wavelengths of light do require different materials to effectively "laze", so the materials used in a 635nm red/orange laser will be different than a 660nm Red vs. a 445nm Blue, vs a 405n, blu-ray diode, etc.

It's often about heat distribution and the quality of the parts.

I think there are basically 3 laser diode types/sizes. I know there's two sizes at least for diodes that are used in things like red/green/blue lasers. I can also say that there are some DPSS lasers that use a C-mount diode system. They're meant for higher outputs... but what the highest output you'd see on something like that, I really don't know.

Edit 1 - The most effective wavelength that we see is 555nm (give or take) so basically 1W of 445nm (Blue) and 1W of 532nm (Green)... if put side by side and all other things being equal, the green is going to look brighter to us.

Edit 2 - Dunno the answer to that one man. I would speculate that 3 and 4W diodes exist, but 10W? Possible but I haven't heard of 'em.

You might want to check out this thread by the way - hopefully it'll help answer other questions you might have

Good To know laser terms: Guide

Maybe spend a few minutes and read through that - might answer SOME questions anyway

enigmahack said:

Wattage is simply the amount of current X voltage going through the diode.

Click to expand...

I think there are basically 3 laser diode types/sizes.

Click to expand...

Of which the 5.6mm wide TO56 package is the most common found in pointers.

^Not quite. Voltage times current is INPUT power. Lasers are rated on their OUTPUT power.

BlueToast said:

(EDIT2: Do 10W diodes even exist? : o )

Click to expand...

Going to focus on that one. 10W diodes do indeed exist, I've seen diode based laser heads in the kilowatt range (not one diode, but still) as far as single bar diodes go (there are multi diode bar arrays that look kind of like [||||||] that can reach hundreds of watts, but the largest single bar diode I know of is 60W, friend of mine has a nice Coherent water cooled one, it's a freakin' monster. These are all IR, at least 808nm and incredibly dangerous because even at these powers you're going to see nothing but a very dim dot despite the incredible power. C-Mount diodes top off at about 5W or so, strongest visible C-Mount I've seen is a 1W 635nm, it would have a terrible beam profile and was nearly $1,000. Hope this helps.