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Re: BEAMSHOT COMPETITION! w/ prizes :) anyone can enter (deadline 11/18)! I think your pictures are very realistic! The laser is Jayrob's pocket mini host. I used a shoebox for the stand, so a shoestring production :)

Re: BEAMSHOT COMPETITION! w/ prizes :) anyone can enter (deadline 11/18)! Those are very good pictures. It's difficult to capture a laser beam and have it appear as it does to the 'naked' eye. Images often appear exaggerated. Your laser beam pictures are realistic and capture the airy...

Re: BEAMSHOT COMPETITION! w/ prizes :) anyone can enter (deadline 11/18)! Photographing lasers aint easy. They don't photograph well. The spot is bloated and overexposed, the fuzz/speckle around the spot isn't visible. Laser beam shots are similarly not easy. The beam tends to be overexposed...

Here's my new 100 mW pocket mini igniting safety matches from ~1 meter. Just enough power to do this. You don't need > 300mW for burning stuff. This is now my favorite laser pointer. The expensive glass lens option was worth it as it greatly improves burning efficiency at low powers. eMX30gipuGk

I've extracted (a) lpc-815 diode from the dvd burner sled. It's a reasonable 'single mode' diode and one can achieve good divergence from a single lens.. it does burn well. What is the beam quality of the 826/836. Are they multimode?

I see you've just completed your first pocket mini build also. I'm quite happy with mine. It looks as though the divergence isn't that good, though it's hard to tell. Like the fisheye lens!

Igniting a safety match from about 1 meter. This would have consumed less time if I'd been able to hold the spot steady.. not bad for ~100mW's. eMX30gipuGk

Completed a Pocket Mini build today. Quite pleased with it. For me half the fun of DIY is planning and building. Over the course of the past several weeks I ordered all the various bits needed for the build. From top:Arctic Silver thermal adhesive, three lpc-815 diode sleds, AixiZ diode...

I've a new mini, and am very very happy with it! I'm using a lpc-815 diode which I'm conservatively running at 200mA (~100 mW output). Copper heatsink and glass lens option. Lots of thermal glue. Hoping for a long life. It's plenty bright. Extracting the diode from the sled was more difficult...

20x DVD burner diode I looked at the power graphs for the lpc-815 diode. Most of the time it appears to be kink free up to ~420mA. Unfortunately these graphs tell one nothing about the lifespan of the part at a given power output. From what little information I could glean most of these diodes...

lol ..

I can say that I've not seen any sort of digital camera that can distinguish the relatively subtle color difference between 635 and 655 nm. Most of these red laser diodes are running between 640-660nm once warmed up. You diffraction grating experiment is interesting however! Visually it is...

That's a good link. It appears the problem with pushing the GaN technology (used to make blu-ray and 445nm lasers) is it quickly becomes very inefficient as you change the recipe to make longer wavelengths (going from blue to green). This is not good for battery operated devices - short...

Yes. LD's often run more efficiently at cold temperatures. If you're not using an APC (automatic power control) supply -- like most of the constant current supplies here. The current required for the diode to reach a given power output tends to decrease with colder temperatures. So when you...

Good question. This is one area open can diode fail. I've no experience with this. If I were to hazard a guess I'd say use compressed air. You likely do NOT want to touch the cleaved facet end of the diode. The is a critical part of a LD. Likely any micro scratches or impurities on the end of...

I'm assuming you want a 'single-mode' (burning) laser. Also.. how long do you want the diode to last? What most people are doing is taking DVD diodes and running these overspec. The more overspec you run the diode, the shorter its life will be. That said, most DVD diodes (20x or higher) can...

Awww. It just failed. Deal with it. Especially if you haven't worked with LDs for long. They're notoriously fragile and easy to destroy. Considering these 445's are exceptionally robust and difficult to wreck you likely just had bad luck. All the people here with experience have toasted lots...

Good question. How long would the phosphor remain dark after shining the laser on it? So.. UV light caused the chemicals on CRT plate to undergo luminescence. Often they absorb radiation at one frequency, then convert to another, usually lower frequency. It's possible a red laser will cause the...

Right. Looking at the press release it appears the big advantage this new 'hybrid light source' has is it lasts much longer and has a slightly larger color gamut than the more common mercury light source. Looking at the little diagram it appears there's only one LD in the device - a blue laser...