Green Laser Recommendation (rugged, lightweight, Waterproof, daylight visible)

Hey Guys,

Have been lurking for a while trying to make up my mind on a laser to buy for a very specific purpose. After reading through tons of reviews and threads, i haven't been able to divine the best choice so turning to your collective wisdom for a recommendation. I'm not sure a product exists to meet all these requirements so would be happy to defer to your judgement on a reasonable compromise.

Application: Green laser for use in technical rock climbing application. Dot (not beam) should be visible in high light situations at a distance of 5 up to 200M away. May also be used for night climbing. At short range (10-100 feet) The laser will be used for tasks such as pointing to key hand/foot holds near a climber on rock that ranges from almost black (Granite) to white (limestone). At longer distances 50-600 feet it will be used to indicate routes above or below a climber. The climber could be as close as a few feet to as far as 40-100 feet from the dot, and in all cases the goal will be for them to look at the dot of the beam on the rock. It is a requirement that both the laser holder (10-600 feet away) and the climber (2-100 feet away) can clearly see the dot on white or black rock in bright daylight conditions.

Desired specifications:
Power is in question. Due to the close proximity of the dot to the climber I'm suspecting recommendations will be <5mw but am concerned the focused point will not be visible at the longer distances. Am curious about a 20 or 30mw laser and if the reflection off white limestone could be dangerous to the climber.

Rugged/Waterproof/dust proof (the pointer will probably hang from my climbing harness and take a beating against the wall and other gear. Dust, moisture are highly probable.

Tight beam

Duty cycle isn't critical as usually the pointer will be used for only 3-10 seconds

Overall battery life should be high

Weight should as low as possible given the rugged requirements. But don't need a boat anchor.

Momentary activation is preferred. I can't think of a time when I will need the laser on continuously

Should be protected from accidental activation to prevent run down of battery or overheating from inadvertent activation.

Thanks for your advice and guidance.

Well that is a pretty stringent list of requirements.
1) green lasers, and DPSS systems in general, are not notoriously rugged. Due to the precise alignment of optics and crystals necessary inside, a dropped or battered green laser is often a dead one. However, there are a few sites that sell various waterproof lasers that have been verified to work under water (I owned one) so it can be said that these are at least 'highly water resistant'.

2) Visibility, I agree with you that 5mW would not be adequate for high light situations where the sun is reflecting off of light colored rocks or you needed the dot to be visible on dark surfaces at extended ranges during the day. For easy daylight viewing at the ranges you indicated (up to 600ft) and under bright conditions, you would need considerably more power. This obviously would present an optical hazard to the climber. I have a 115 mW green pen that is just visible at the ranges you indicated during bright daylight on light surfaces. That kind of power at night however, would be blindingly bright to the climber if it were near them, which is the last thing I think someone would want dangling from a rock face.

It seems like you would need 2 different lasers. A high powered (definitely over 50mW) for the daytime and a 5mW for nighttime use. Considering how close you would be pointing that high powered day use laser to the climber makes me hesitant to suggest it because reflections and accidental lasing are a definite possibility and could result in permanent eye damage.

Ultimately the decision is yours, and both 5mW and 50+mW greens can be had for relatively little money. Possibly it would be a good idea to invest in these and test them out alone before using them around anyone else. Be advised as well that cheap green lasers labeled as "5mW" can be much higher in power ( I recently measured one at 35mW) and can contain a lot of invisible but dangerous IR radiation.

:beer:

Thank you for the quick response.

I was leaning toward green for the viability factor. Are there other colors where the device would be more robust for some reason?

Yeah, any non DPSS system should be considerably more shock resistant as they use a single diode to emit the laser light, not a diode pumping a series of precisely aligned crystals as in DPSS. There are a few options as far as wavelengths go: 405nm (blueray), 445nm, 660nm (standard red), and the newly on the market high powered 635nm. Of these the most visible would be the 635nm and the 445nm, but both of these are multimode diodes and the beam quality isn't all that good.

I believe green is still your best option because to get the same visibility that a green pointer has, all the other wavelengths would have to be many times as powerful. As an example, my 115mW green (532nm) is equally as bright as my 1100mW 445nm.

dieck said:

1. I'm suspecting recommendations will be <5mw but am concerned the focused point will not be visible at the longer distances.

2. Am curious about a 20 or 30mw laser and if the reflection off white limestone could be dangerous to the climber.

Rugged/Waterproof/dust proof (the pointer will probably hang from my climbing harness and take a beating against the wall and other gear. Dust, moisture are highly probable.

Click to expand...

1. It will not be visible in daytime conditions from the "pointer's" vantage, but will be extremely visible to the climber.

2. Yes a 30mW laser dot at close proximity to one's (unprotected) eye off of white limestone could cause permanent damage, and can potentially flash-blind the climber, even in daytime conditions.

The only "waterproof/dustproof/semi-rugged pointers that I know of are at rayfoss. link

Just a small suggestion here. You could have a X mode driver and have different power settings for the desired application. This would be perfect for night and day applications.

Aside from lasers designed to be mounted on guns, I wouldn't considering ANY lasers to be rugged enough to survive getting banged against rocks.

Ash- if the OP got a measured verified 10 mw green, wouldn't that be the best of all worlds in that the dot would be visible in the daytime but not be particularly dangerous as a reflection (unless a mirror or glass) ?

Also if it was a focusable laser and the beam was set to diverge a bit- would that minimize the reflective danger also?

In other words a 10 mw laser with the beam spread out to 8 " circle at 50 yards would be similar to a 5 milliwatt with almost no divergence concerning eye damage ?

Also does the beam get weaker after a few hundred feet or is the eye danger roughly the same as from 5 feet ?

Infitus- I've thought of getting a 10 mw green laser made for gun site, because they are rechageable- but I might just get a 30 mw and pay to have it modded down to 10 mw- or even better an external pot that would go from 2 mw up to 10mw and an IR filter- on a nice 18650 rechargeable laser.

Could work for the OP as well, right ?

Try seeing the dot from a 10mW green in full sun at 600ft...

I have a 30mw green laser weapon sight from Aixiz laser. The cost was about $150 with shipping and should be rugged being a weapons sight. I have measured it at 34mw peak power with a fresh battery and tapers down to 30mw at 2 minutes. Visibility is excellent at night with beam trace. During the day the dot would visible but more difficult to see as the distance grows.

What I can give in this thread ...

You can buy one of swimminsurfer256's lasers IIRC thats his name... Hes selling them in teh Buy Sell Trade Lasers section, at a price of 12$ shipped. The only problem is that it IS a grab bag, and thus you can be sure of its power, however, It is certainly a few times brighter than some of my 5mW lasers, I own one personally.

He sells two flavors two, both in pen lasers, and output 30mW avg. and 70mW avg. They are unreasonably bright.

Jetlasers Ti-B series is the most rugged/water-proof green laser up to date, I think, pls correct me if I'm wrong.

Jaxz said:

Jetlasers Ti-B series is the most rugged/water-proof green laser up to date, I think, pls correct me if I'm wrong.

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It's still a dpss... as such I doubt it will stand up harsh punishment such as being banged on the side of a cliff.

InfinitusEquitas said:

It's still a dpss... as such I doubt it will stand up harsh punishment such as being banged on the side of a cliff.

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According to Jetlasers, the previous model Ti-lite A 100/532 can already survive a 8 storey fall from height. Someone also did a review with his Ti-lite A by rolling it down his house stair without damaging it. Though it is not as harsh as compared to a clift, but which laser can survive an 8 storey fall other that Jetlasers?

Jaxz said:

According to Jetlasers, the previous model Ti-lite A 100/532 can already survive a 8 storey fall from height. Someone also did a review with his Ti-lite A by rolling it down his house stair without damaging it. Though it is not as harsh as compared to a clift, but which laser can survive an 8 storey fall other that Jetlasers?

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An iphone 3g survived falling from a plane... that does not mean that iphones are capable of surviving such drops does it?

A single anecdote does not make for empirical evidence.

Bottom line, lasers are rather fragile.

Rolling a laser down stairs is nowhere near the same as slamming one with your weight against a rock. I mean think about it rolling down the stairs, you're looking at drops of a foot and half max... that's not a big drop.

Just look on the forum at how many "I dropped my laser" threads there are... I just don't want to see someone spend a lot of money and have a broken laser a week later.

If a newwish pen can survive for a time, than yes, a higher quality laser such as a ti-b would be the way to go. I suggest it strictly as a way to test out just how harsh the conditions are before making a plunge into something more expensive.

InfinitusEquitas said:

An iphone 3g survived falling from a plane... that does not mean that iphones are capable of surviving such drops does it?

A single anecdote does not make for empirical evidence.

Bottom line, lasers are rather fragile.

Rolling a laser down stairs is nowhere near the same as slamming one with your weight against a rock. I mean think about it rolling down the stairs, you're looking at drops of a foot and half max... that's not a big drop.

Just look on the forum at how many "I dropped my laser" threads there are... I just don't want to see someone spend a lot of money and have a broken laser a week later.

If a newwish pen can survive for a time, than yes, a higher quality laser such as a ti-b would be the way to go. I suggest it strictly as a way to test out just how harsh the conditions are before making a plunge into something more expensive.

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If a Ti-B cannot survive, might as well forget about other lasers... Besides, Ti-B comes with other wavelength, if DPSS is not suitable, then choose other wavelength for your Ti-B.