405nm laser lava lamp.

[Tech_Junkie]

^Yeah, I read that bit but I saw a homebrew lava lamp, (I think it was on here. Did TJ post it?), that used a low watt bulb and diluted liquid soap for the convection effect.

That was a cloud lamp, and I'm still gathering parts. I found a huge glass cylinder (36" tall, 12" diameter) and am waiting for the blue LEDs to arrive from China to give the water a blue tint, like the sky. I might add a spinning magnet to the bottom to make a tornado lamp. Not sure if I can add a laser to it, :thinking: but obviously I will try. :eg:

Nice work Jan, and good idea Dave. You can pick up used lava lamps for ~$5 at any local flee market.

 

[dieselmarine]

Good job!!! This is my kind of build. I have a mini lava lamp that's in some need of modding, thanks for the idea bro. Keep your unique builds coming.

-Sarge

 

[millirad]

Nice work Jander! Some good ideas from other members here as well. I have one too, if someone wants to try it. You would carefully dismantle a lava lamp and put a 90 degree optic at the bottom. Then don't throw away the oil and wax but just separate them. Now you would put dye/highlighter in the wax and mix it evenly. Put the oil and wax back in the lamp. Now here's the tricky part. You need to make some kind of doughnut shaped heater element that allows a 90 degree directed beam to pass thru from the bottom. The wax moves around randomly and when struck by the beam it glows what ever colour you want, similar to Dave's idea. This allows very random periods of intense glowing. ;-) Edit: lava lamps have been used in the lab to generate "true" random numbers with lasers, so this could be used for encryption, as a "key" generator(one time pad).

 

[HIMNL9]

There are some ring heaters, around, but they are normally used for industrial use, and are not exactly cheap ..... the only one "relatively" cheap, stated as "ring heater" that i've found is this one on ebay, but the description is very poor and incomplete, so i'm not sure that it can be used for that use.

or, there are "flat strips" heaters, made with siliconed fabric, like this one, that can be "wrapped" around the base of the bottle, maybe .....

Another alternative can be "wire heater", it's a 1,5 or 2mm "core" made with a fiberglass rope, with a thin spiral of nichrome wire rolled on it, and covered with a HT silicone tube ..... it can be shaped in a lot of shapes, so also in a spiral that cover the bottom of the bottle, except the center ..... sometimes can be found as "spare part" for those "feet hydro massager" machines, where is usually placed under the water container for heat it, if is impossible to find it in other ways ..... Or, if you are lucky enough, can be found in old refrigerators as "door frame heater" (used for prevent that the door frame can be blocked from ice), in some dumpsters (but you need to find a dumpster that left you mangle the refrigerators for see if there's any heater in or not, and not all of the refrigerators have it)

 

[jmgallego]

Jander6442,

Love it!!! Really nice, I bet it looks great in front of you (vs in photos)

+1Rep for innovation, imagination, practicality and simplicity!!




Now... where did I put that lava lamp I had back in my college days?... :undecided:

 

[jander6442]

Thank you members for the kind words. I have tooled around with all of the above and for the convection or heat cycling of the lamp I have not found a laymen idea yet:thinking: any material in the substrate would end up blocking the beam or diffusing of the beam.

I'm going to try 50% water 50% pickle juice after a bit. I'm also going to try a 50/50 of good ol radiator fluid.


Any one know a good a x-ray tech that will give us some of that pet-scan material.:crackup:
One more note. Safety is always a concern so be careful.

Patent# 6442

 

[BruceN]

Shoot me a pm with your info and I will send you a tiny bottle of flourisine dye. One ounce is sufficient for 800 gallons of water, so a drop of this stuff a little larger than a pinhead (just dip a toothpick in it) in your lava lamp full of water will probably be all it takes. The phrase "super concentrated" doesn't even begin to do it justice. It's for uv applications (which is what I use it for at work) but should light up quite nicely at 405nm.

Bruce

PS - The price will be that you'll have to post pics of how cool it is within a reasonable time. :eg:

 

[jander6442]

PM sent

 

[Milos]

pretty, pretty, prettyyyy good

I like it !!

 

[DTR]

Nice project.:beer:

Have you tried defocusing the laser a little. I love the look a wide beam in smoke.

 

[jander6442]

Haven't tried to defocus yet. I'm looking to get some radioactive isotope fluid in there next. Thanks to new forum member Bruce for that

Thanks Milos for the compliment it means alot to me I've always respected you here
on this fine forum.

 

[Milos]

Thank you.
it is very nice, reminds me of alien beam from the bottom of the UFO about to beam something up (or burn a hole in the ground)

best regards

 

[iskor12]

Jander....Long time, no see. Thanks for mentioning me...It means a lot. Now on to your build.
:worthy: :worthy: :worthy:
Your build turned out much better than I ever thought it would....(and I thought it would be good, but this blew me away). I am happy that I sent that Heatsink down to you.
Not that it needs it, but I am eager to see what a 8x diode would look like.

Great Job. If this forum would let me send you a +1...I would.

FYI: I am much better now. I haven't been able to spend much time on here, mainly because my work place now has an Internet Filter... I will try to visit more often, and who knows, maybe I'll start another build.

Later,
Iskor12
Heath

 

[jander6442]

Glad to have you back. I see that your happy with what I did with your diode torture device. I'm stoked that your over the bad spell you had too.

With that being said I need to talk to you... so it's late now, but there is some urgency to speak to you. Please keep an eye on my incoming PM.

 

[BruceN]

Say, did that dye sample ever make it to you?

BruceN

 

[jander6442]

Say, did that dye sample ever make it to you?

BruceN

Yes, and thank you sir!... video is up and running in the OP.

Good stuff...:bowdown:any other fun things you could think of with dat