Testing of the New 650nm/660nm 5W Diode.!

lazeerer said:

Thats terrible Rick. Iam so sorry.

Yes Iam working on a Buck driver for these now. With soft start.!

(Not sure about 1 cell setups>!)

It will be a 2 cell setup.

My X-drives only go up to ~3A.

SO the one iam going to be making will do ~5A or i might go for the 7A Chip. Not sure.!

But i am working on the driver.

Click to expand...

I have to add the beam at 2w looked so good it was bright for a red laser and looked like it went for miles the size of my 9mm 445nm using a 60mm lens.
Need drivers bad help !!!!!!!!!!!! me!!!!!!

Hey Rick. I think it is indeed your driver.

I could not let it go so i actually beated on one to show that no issues at higher currants and i made a video.

You can seen in the video bellow "Not so scientific" But it gets the point.

If this quick On off up down currant change etc is not killing the diode here on my setup then iam not sure what happened on your end.

Maybe not a spike but a really nasty ripple or nasty oscillating in the output.

Here is the video:

Sorry for the Quality.

lazeerer said:

Hey Rick. I think it is indeed your driver.

I could not let it go so i actually beated on one to show that no issues at higher currants and i made a video.

You can seen in the video bellow "Not so scientific" But it gets the point.

If this quick On off up down currant change etc is not killing the diode here on my setup then iam not sure what happened on your end.

Maybe not a spike but a really nasty ripple or nasty oscillating in the output.

Here is the video:

Sorry for the Quality.

Click to expand...

It has to be the drivers dtr tested the 2.5A I used and I had no problem with it .I was hoping the 5A 808nm driver would work its a $70 drive but test showed it did not .can you make a video of the diode in the heatsink to see how that heatsink works, it looked like a good one ,was it mad for c-mount? thanks for the help, hope some one can find a good 5A drive to run these bad boyes

Do you guys think these would work?
BlitzBuck V3.1


BlitzBuck V3.1 (Rectangular) Adjustable 1.2-3.1A - $19.99 : Cajunlasers Store

lazeerer said:

SO you probably blew it due to some kind of spike.

I would probebly want to design something with a soft start too. WHich i am..

Ive tested several of these diodes to above 5A with no issue.

Whatever happened was not due to the diode but something causeing the diode to fail.

Click to expand...

Lazeerer,

Hey. I'm going to be a nit-picky arse here for a second. I just want to clear up a common misconception about this. And maybe you can save some of your time and money.

A good clean transient and a current spike are two different things. Soft start is a nice place to start - but it doesn't really protect from spikes. Lots of times, soft start features are built into smps controllers and ICs because the nature of the smps' start up sequence goes:

A) Begin current flow

B) If error signal is detected, regulation starts up next

C) Allow current

D) Repeat between B and C for entire remainder of operation

The IC cannot regulate anything if there is no error signal, and error signals comes from currents/voltages that are different (higher/lower) than the set value. The "inrush" of current in step A can be more carefully controlled with an very good IC. But an ideal/fast chip will regulate BEFORE a large error signal is created. Most ICs can get away without it just fine - those were probably made for LEDs.

If your startup is halfway decent, a good current spike can still ruin your day by the end of it all. So go ahead and whack the diode with straight up square waves all you want, and it will be just fine. Slow starting it only "rounds" off the front edge of the transient - it doesn't protect the diode from extra-driver-related spikes and the mis-handling caused ones too.

If you're super paranoid - go ahead and just install capacitors on the inputs and outputs of your circuit, and enjoy the steady state stability. But if an actual spike comes your way, be ready with something like a ground short or a LASORB.

The only thing I've seen work consistently, is the LASORB. You can toss your laser diode into a fooking telsa coil if you like - if you've got one of those.

So you could spend all day reading datasheets about smps IC regulation stability and transient control, or you can spend $8 on a little plastic square to do away with your worries.

/boring lecture

WOW, just WOW, imagine this built into a dual diode build, easy 10w of red :evil:
cant wait for these to progress into hanhelds, that would be amazing :drool:
as always you the man lazereer

Thanks MB :beer: , looks exciting! What applications have you used this on?

__________________________________________________________

Lol, "This isn't any armed guard, this is an armed guard from Texas." Looks most impressive MB

~ LB

Meatball said:

Lazeerer,

Hey. I'm going to be a nit-picky arse here for a second. I just want to clear up a common misconception about this. And maybe you can save some of your time and money.

A good clean transient and a current spike are two different things. Soft start is a nice place to start - but it doesn't really protect from spikes. Lots of times, soft start features are built into smps controllers and ICs because the nature of the smps' start up sequence goes:

A) Begin current flow

B) If error signal is detected, regulation starts up next

C) Allow current

D) Repeat between B and C for entire remainder of operation

The IC cannot regulate anything if there is no error signal, and error signals comes from currents/voltages that are different (higher/lower) than the set value. The "inrush" of current in step A can be more carefully controlled with an very good IC. But an ideal/fast chip will regulate BEFORE a large error signal is created. Most ICs can get away without it just fine - those were probably made for LEDs.

If your startup is halfway decent, a good current spike can still ruin your day by the end of it all. So go ahead and whack the diode with straight up square waves all you want, and it will be just fine. Slow starting it only "rounds" off the front edge of the transient - it doesn't protect the diode from extra-driver-related spikes and the mis-handling caused ones too.

If you're super paranoid - go ahead and just install capacitors on the inputs and outputs of your circuit, and enjoy the steady state stability. But if an actual spike comes your way, be ready with something like a ground short or a LASORB.

The only thing I've seen work consistently, is the LASORB. You can toss your laser diode into a fooking telsa coil if you like - if you've got one of those.

So you could spend all day reading datasheets about smps IC regulation stability and transient control, or you can spend $8 on a little plastic square to do away with your worries.

/boring lecture

Click to expand...

Hey there buddy.

I think you gave this Lecture to the wrong member.

This is why i only use my laser drivers because they dont have these issue because i designed them not to.. No one has ever kill a diode due to my drivers causing the issue.

Iam not having any issue with killing diodes to be clear or driver issue to be clear and thats why i showed the video because Rick killed 2 On an UNKNOWN driver.

The soft start iam speaking of is not the built in one that comes on SOME IC's that you are referring to. It is addition to that.

Alot of overseas drivers do not have any kind of protections but maybe a few caps good enough for LEDs and sadly i would not even say LEDs on some drivers Ive seen.

Adding too much Capacitance on the input or output or both can really mess with the Ripple and make the driver perform badly. I would not mess with that unless the driver you bought was not designed correctly and is missing the correct amount of capacitance needed.

Ive added addition Soft Start Sweep to all my lasers drivers i sell these days and can make the sweep up to power pretty much as long as i want. It will never Jump past 50% of the set sweep. I have talked to custom diode makers of rare wavelength diodes with a few Ive bought over the years and the few people in there engineer area have told me countless times a soft start & or "Sweep" to full currant is very important for sensitive diodes.

This is why you see it on ALL high end laser Lab systems. (Like JDSU,MG Coherent etc...) They all have it. I have quit a few different systems and have looked over there controllers for some time now and its usually a 5-10 second soft start sweep.

Its why i have additional soft start on all my Drivers now. I cant even remember how many drivers Ive sold over the years but i have never had one tell me any of my drivers where responsible for killing there diode, so any of the X-Line drivers are all OK.

The issue that people always seem to have is with use of Unknown or LED drivers or very cheap laser drivers from Onehunglow.

Very rarely you ever here someone having issue with any of the laser drivers sold on this forum let alone my laser drivers.


So i dont have the issues you mention though i know many have..

Maybe i was not detailed enough.

But to be clear I do not have any issues with drivers i use or Make.

All my drivers have input and out caps. Of course.

Did you forget what drivers i make.?


Good lecture though iam sure it will help a few.:beer:

It was not boring.:beer:

+4



Rick,

That lab style heatsink setup is OK for testing purposes. Its not large enough.

Further More the Lens.! "IT SUCKS" LOL

Seriously it not glass and is coated for High IR. Unless they have changed it for different model then i dont know but the power loss is crazy. Almost 50%.

It does make a OK beam thats for sure but i would not dare use it.!

I replaced it with a Similar lens to my 50mm lens i showed in the beginning.

I did a thread a long time ago on it.

You can see the thread here.

http://laserpointerforums.com/f46/lab-c-mount-housing-67701.html

I took plenty of picture in that thread. I even modded one for better performing for 5.6mm diodes and using a stock 12mm module in the thread.

I know one can modulate an LD well into the GHz range if needed - where they hit a goofy sort of "resonance" state I'm not at all familiar with. But once the diode is "warmed up", do you suppose therein lies a difference?

I'm fairly certain its not a di/dt that damages the diode, its rather the peak current. But, I suppose if you whack a 9 mm blue with 2.5A right away, there may be some risk of thermal shock - where things heat up too quickly. If the case is well sinked, the rate of heat flow is still limited to the thermal resistance between the junction and the case and to the heatsink.

That might imply there is a fairly high Tjc where instantaneous heat build up collects quickly but can't leave quite fast enough. But surely this does not apply to some dinky and "sensitive" PHR LD where the peak current never passes 150mA. A 5-10 second sweep is so longgggggggg. If its not a peak current that kills - what mechanism causes the diode to fail? What is the mode of failure? Is there a junction capacitance that restrains a voltage change but allows the current surge?

Does adding another 1uf in || to your load really throw off regulation? I suppose that might depend on load current and switching frequency.

I was trying to figure this out earlier today on a 50A diode. If it runs away from me, will it short? Or remain open?

Well, its been a longgg time since I've been driver shopping. I'll concede that I'm not very up-to-date on the new features of these things. Do you add an IC that works the adjustable ramp feature you mentioned? Seems like an expensive add on!

LB - Just finished an analog modulated 50A driver today! Its efficiency sucks but its got a fast slew rate!

Meatball said:

The only thing I've seen work consistently, is the LASORB. You can toss your laser diode into a fooking telsa coil if you like - if you've got one of those.

Click to expand...

Somehow I think Pdis (Power Dissipation) might ruin your day in that scenario, care to test it? :wink: But I do agree that Lasorb is the best way to protect from voltage spikes and transients.

I dont have the tools to test any of this stuff into detail to get any close of answers what causes the "Actual" Fail.

The reason there is such a long sweep on a diode on those high end lasers systems is to prolong the life of the diode and usually they run the diodes well bellow we do to help ad that.

But one of the more Important issue and Can cause a death is Thermal induced Overshoot. Big Problems here.

Some laser diodes are very temperature sensitive as in "More Efficient at lower Temperatures". This is very true for many Red laser diode as well as far IR diodes.
Under normal condition the diode heats itself up so that the laser junction is 10-20C above the Temp of the heatsink itself.

However if FULL Currant is open up it does take .5 Seconds to 1 second or so for the laser to heat itself up to its steady temp state.

So for the first few hundred milliseconds after this sudden turn on the laser junction is still much colder then in steady-state. Thus, the normal CW currant the laser is running may drive the laser to a much higher then rated power during this warm-up time split seconds. This may damage or kill the diode instantly.

The Solution to this problem is to limit the Rise it Currant when you are turning the laser on. Like a time lag,Sweep,soft start whatever... It must be long enough to allow the laser diode to heat up and prevent overshot peak power. Even a few mW can matter with some diodes.

A typical good sweep is ~1-2 seconds. You can cut that down by adding in the 50% quick start.
Here i have the X-Boost showing it though for the life of me i cant find the video i had UL showing the currant ramp up rather then the power but that is a OPHIR HEAD with fast response time and as you can see the laser is turned on and starts at ~ 350mW (I think i had it set to 30% for this guys laser then sweeps up to full power at the end iam just showing the draw of currant the driver is pulling):



Iam not sure what causes his diodes to die. They LED not went Open with the unknown driver he is using.

It could be so many reasons to be honest. All we can do is try to prevent all those reasons with as many add on as we can put.

When I killed one of these diodes on purpose to see where they pop at it was at 7.8A.
I ramped up the currant so it was not from thermal shock induced overshoot but too much currant.

Most diode if not in just about every case if it will die it will be at turn on.!

Rare do you see a diode lasing then just die.

So whatever is happening it is happening right when the laser is turned on.


Iam not sure what you mean by run away on you... remain open or short on the 50A diode.?


Sweet. Thats Awesome.:beer:

Here is the 20A Buck Driver iam working on for everyone. "Not for these diodes"


I was not fast enough to get it done in time for LB. He and another member was actually the reason i started it due to there request for higher currant and i dont have anything available in there range of request.

Though 50A is Impressive. Must be a Monster.:drool:

Meatball...

LB - Just finished an analog modulated 50A driver today! Its efficiency sucks but its got a fast slew rate!

Click to expand...

50A! Most impressive Sir. Fast slew rate (had to Google thanks) Maybe we'll get to see that driver in action

Norse hero Sigurthr...

Somehow I think Pdis (Power Dissipation) might ruin your day in that scenario, care to test it? :wink:

Click to expand...

"Pdis" Thank you Sig, an very important thing to keep in mind

Laseerer...

Maybe i was not detailed enough.

But to be clear I do not have any issues with drivers i use or Make.

Click to expand...

It is apparent Sir that you have researched and put in a huge amount of effort over the years to provide the best drivers and diodes possible for the forum members or you would not be as beloved as you are :beer: Unfortunate that you have had to defend yourself and your excellent work because of some growing pains with a new (albeit exciting) diode.

Forgive my ignorance gentlemen, I am quite impressed by all of you :bowdown:

~ LB

Just my two cents, as a consumer, but I do love Angelos' drivers! The soft start is a great feature. I've only ever experienced one issue with an X-Boost, in that its output seems to oscillate when the diode is cool.

Not a single Lazeerer driver has killed any of my diodes, and I'd buy up all of his X-Boosts if I could. Now that I am embracing buck drivers, I have used the X-Drive and the BluitzBuck. I find I like the X-Drive so much better. The Blitz is a fine driver, but I never feel like it's quite as protective of my diodes.

I've been patiently waiting on this new, monster driver from Angelos. I'm excited about using something so powerful, yet elegant.

If it oscillate then that either you cell not able to handle the power or the driver got damaged.

I have 2 scopes so i find that hard to believe that it does unless its one of the fallowing.^.

What currant drivers this is.? Because Ive never heard that before.

Perhaps oscillation isn't the proper word to use here. If I wasn't under time constraints, I'd make a video showing the issue. Maybe next week.

To more adequately describe the action of the driver:
When it is initially turned on from a cold start, the diode comes on immediately, quickly dims greatly, then comes right back to full power. But, for the first 30 seconds to a minute or so, the beam's brightness fluctuates, mildly. The "oscillation" in output speeds up until it's no longer really noticeable.

Originally, I had a heatsink on the IC and the inductor, but removed the one from the inductor. The driver is heavily heatsinked to the pill as well.

It's a quirk in the laser, but I've never felt the need to replace it. This laser is my daily-driver and the one I use at work to burn hair, fibers, etc.

I'll likely kill the diode from heavy use, long before the driver fails. Should I ever need to replace the diode, it will give me a chance to have the driver scoped.

As it is, I've bought 4-5 more X-series drivers since, and will continue to buy more. I love the soft start feature, and feel really safe driving my 405nm with it.

EDIT: I should have mentioned that I drive this laser exclusively with 3400mAh Panasonic 18650s from Larry.

No need for a video i know what your talking about.

That Fluctuation in the brightness is your cell cant handle the currant or having trouble or is sagging to low Or due to the bad cap.

What currant is the driver at.? I take it its a High currant.

To keep it simple The Driver is Damaged from Being Overheated.Mainly the cap next to the chip if its a round version that is part of the sweep. If you remove that it will fix the issue but you will loose that sweep.

However send the driver to me and ill send you a replacement. No worries Good as new.

Ive seen that before. Its Excessive heat that damaged the cap..

The guy dint have it heatsinks at first and since that cap is the closest to the IC it overheated i guess. It was a 2A driver.

Though it is not a good idea to heatsink the Inductor. That can mess things up and might also have been possible why the driver got damaged. Not sure. Could be the inductor got damaged when you removed the heatsink too. Again Not sure.

Anyway Ive seen it before and it has to do with the cap next to the Chip becoming damaged.

The drivers are so small that they can heat up very fast. So you have to be careful.

It can also be damaged with a soldering iron . Though highly unlikely.

Ive only seen 1 other driver do this so its for sure UN common.

The Laser should come on at ~50% then sweep up. The Dim in power could be your cell not able to handle increasing currant. Not sure or again that cap is damaged....


PM me and ill take care of this for you.

"We are starting to get a little off topic"

The pan 3400mah cells are good but do have trouble with Sagging at the 4.5A draw on higher currant settings. Could also be not think enough wires. I recommend 20-22AWG wiring for high currant.

I show that in my last SXB video with how much they Sag under high load stress with boost drivers. If your voltage on the cell is already low the sag underload will make it go bellow the 3.6V/3.7V the driver can go down to on High Currant settings.