I had originally planned on waiting until I got some of those tested "anti-green" goggles. But for the last several days, that product page (and that whole section of FP's web site) has been MIA!
Finally, I could wait no more. With all the problems/mixed results ppl have been reporting about these new modules, I just had to know!
Did I get ripped-off, or a good deal?
So I hot-wired something up, pointed it well away from anything reflective, and fired-up my new DX 100mw green module! :yh::yh::yh:
:lasergun:
First thing I noticed was that the "splotch" size was noticeably larger, and at least 4x brighter, than my 10mw.
The big resistor stayed cool, I didn't accidentally start anything on fire with the beam
, and realizing this wasn't some dragon about to jump up and consume me in a blaze of green glory, I felt comfortable doing some more testing. :yh:
So I took it into the living room, to check the beam appearance. I was disappointed that the beam was not even visible in a lit room at night! So I killed the lights in that room (semi-dark), beam didn't look much different than how my low-power ones look :cryyy: - not solid, but very light in color, with bright speckles. The beam was also very thin-looking.
I could also see that the beam was coming-out at an angle - no doubt the result of the poor manufacturing alignment I had reported here before.
I also noticed a speckly-type effect coming from the aperture around where the beam was exiting - I'm not sure if that was laser light bouncing-around inside due to the misalignment, or if this effect is normal for a laser at this power level?
So I decided to take it outside, and see how it did in the night sky.
Beam was visible, but not what I would call overly impressive. I did notice that as I moved it from straight vertical to a more shallow angle (so that it had more air to travel through before it hit a cloud or got above the layer of atmosphere where a green is more visible), that the end of the beam seemed to get a little bit fatter/more solid, which was kinda cool-looking.
So then I tried my True 5 beam for comparison (which although slightly less powerful than my 10mw, has a much more visible beam), and I could barely see the beam! :huh:
It was at that point I realized the adverse testing conditions - well-lit area (so I could see the contraption I had jury-rigged), brightly-lit sky (almost blue), and staring at a nearly full moon!
OK, so perhaps the 100mw beam would fair better under more optimum nighttime conditions.
But as I was jumping from a <10mw, not to a 30mw, or even a 50mw, but all the way up to 100mw (and one that was likely a misaligned 200mw unit), I was expecting a MUCH bigger difference in power than what I was seeing!
Not even being able to see the beam indoors at night was also a major disappointment, :cryyy: as normal room lighting is MUCH less intense than daylight.
I was expecting something MUCH brighter than this! :cryyy:
I am wondering if the obviously mis-aligned components are cutting-off part of my power?
But then I thought of something else. I jury-rigged it with what I had lying-around at the time - a pair of new dollar-store alkaline AAA's, taped end-to-end. But that large, open-can IR laser diode they have in there - even if it's only a 500mw, that still likely takes ~150-200ma just to get it past threshold. And as much as 600ma to operate at 500mw 808 (and more if they are over-driving it, as from what others indicated seems may be the case). Doing some research, AA alkalines are suppose to be able to put out 1A - but what about AAA's???
I also realized that while others were reporting that big resistor getting extremely hot, the base of the module (where the IR LD is mounted), just got barely warm, and the big resistor didn't even do that!
Is it possible that my poor dollar-store AAA's just didn't have the juice to power a 9mm 500mw IR laser diode at full power?
So, my questions to you are...
What is a 100mw green beam suppose to look like? Should you be able to see it in a lit room at night?
and...
Do AAA batteries have enough horsepower to fully power a 100 or 200mw module with a large open-can IR 500mw diode?
Or is this thing gonna get a heck of a lot brighter if I hook-up some larger batteries to it?
Thanks all! :yh:
Finally, I could wait no more. With all the problems/mixed results ppl have been reporting about these new modules, I just had to know!
Did I get ripped-off, or a good deal?
So I hot-wired something up, pointed it well away from anything reflective, and fired-up my new DX 100mw green module! :yh::yh::yh:
:lasergun:
First thing I noticed was that the "splotch" size was noticeably larger, and at least 4x brighter, than my 10mw.
The big resistor stayed cool, I didn't accidentally start anything on fire with the beam
, and realizing this wasn't some dragon about to jump up and consume me in a blaze of green glory, I felt comfortable doing some more testing. :yh:So I took it into the living room, to check the beam appearance. I was disappointed that the beam was not even visible in a lit room at night!
So I killed the lights in that room (semi-dark), beam didn't look much different than how my low-power ones look :cryyy: - not solid, but very light in color, with bright speckles. The beam was also very thin-looking.I could also see that the beam was coming-out at an angle - no doubt the result of the poor manufacturing alignment I had reported here before.
I also noticed a speckly-type effect coming from the aperture around where the beam was exiting - I'm not sure if that was laser light bouncing-around inside due to the misalignment, or if this effect is normal for a laser at this power level?
So I decided to take it outside, and see how it did in the night sky.
Beam was visible, but not what I would call overly impressive. I did notice that as I moved it from straight vertical to a more shallow angle (so that it had more air to travel through before it hit a cloud or got above the layer of atmosphere where a green is more visible), that the end of the beam seemed to get a little bit fatter/more solid, which was kinda cool-looking.
So then I tried my True 5 beam for comparison (which although slightly less powerful than my 10mw, has a much more visible beam), and I could barely see the beam! :huh:
It was at that point I realized the adverse testing conditions - well-lit area (so I could see the contraption I had jury-rigged), brightly-lit sky (almost blue), and staring at a nearly full moon!
OK, so perhaps the 100mw beam would fair better under more optimum nighttime conditions.
But as I was jumping from a <10mw, not to a 30mw, or even a 50mw, but all the way up to 100mw (and one that was likely a misaligned 200mw unit), I was expecting a MUCH bigger difference in power than what I was seeing!
Not even being able to see the beam indoors at night was also a major disappointment, :cryyy: as normal room lighting is MUCH less intense than daylight.
I was expecting something MUCH brighter than this! :cryyy:
I am wondering if the obviously mis-aligned components are cutting-off part of my power?
But then I thought of something else. I jury-rigged it with what I had lying-around at the time - a pair of new dollar-store alkaline AAA's, taped end-to-end. But that large, open-can IR laser diode they have in there - even if it's only a 500mw, that still likely takes ~150-200ma just to get it past threshold. And as much as 600ma to operate at 500mw 808 (and more if they are over-driving it, as from what others indicated seems may be the case). Doing some research, AA alkalines are suppose to be able to put out 1A - but what about AAA's???
I also realized that while others were reporting that big resistor getting extremely hot, the base of the module (where the IR LD is mounted), just got barely warm, and the big resistor didn't even do that!
Is it possible that my poor dollar-store AAA's just didn't have the juice to power a 9mm 500mw IR laser diode at full power?
So, my questions to you are...
What is a 100mw green beam suppose to look like? Should you be able to see it in a lit room at night?
and...
Do AAA batteries have enough horsepower to fully power a 100 or 200mw module with a large open-can IR 500mw diode?
Or is this thing gonna get a heck of a lot brighter if I hook-up some larger batteries to it?
Thanks all! :yh:
