I wanted to try this for a while now: take a 3*AG13 keychain pointer and turn it into a BR. Finally got around to do it.
DX Sku.12323 was chosen as a host.
It is a cheap 650nm pointer running on three AG13 / LR44 alkaline batteries.
The original driver 'circuit' consists of a single resistor (and the side switch of course).
The idea was to use a 10180 3.7V Li-Ion battery as a power source for a step-up converter driving the blu-ray diode.
I think credit for the '10180 replacing three AG13s'-idea goes to Jayrob.
The original red diode doesn't even have a casing, the chip sits directly inside the brass lens holder.
But the lens holder has a cutout that perfectly fits the can of a 5.6mm laser diode, I used thermal epoxy in order to have a little bit of heatsinking for the PHR.
Removed the original switch from its old PCB and hot-glued it onto a blank space of my driver's board, used one of the switch's legs to support the battery spring and connected the other to Vin (violet wire to the other side), diode's case provides the negative return path.
The driver is set to deliver 80mA.
The original plastic lens produces a remarkable clean dot with 405nm (with lots of optical losses I am sure, I doubt that thing is coated for any wavelength).
Output on my Lasercheck reads 50mW.
Other than the original PCB, diode and batteries, every single part of the original host was recycled in this build
DX Sku.12323 was chosen as a host.
It is a cheap 650nm pointer running on three AG13 / LR44 alkaline batteries.
The original driver 'circuit' consists of a single resistor (and the side switch of course).
The idea was to use a 10180 3.7V Li-Ion battery as a power source for a step-up converter driving the blu-ray diode.
I think credit for the '10180 replacing three AG13s'-idea goes to Jayrob.
The original red diode doesn't even have a casing, the chip sits directly inside the brass lens holder.
But the lens holder has a cutout that perfectly fits the can of a 5.6mm laser diode, I used thermal epoxy in order to have a little bit of heatsinking for the PHR.
Removed the original switch from its old PCB and hot-glued it onto a blank space of my driver's board, used one of the switch's legs to support the battery spring and connected the other to Vin (violet wire to the other side), diode's case provides the negative return path.
The driver is set to deliver 80mA.
The original plastic lens produces a remarkable clean dot with 405nm (with lots of optical losses I am sure, I doubt that thing is coated for any wavelength).
Output on my Lasercheck reads 50mW.
Other than the original PCB, diode and batteries, every single part of the original host was recycled in this build
