ABL COIL laser

[vortish]

The Air Force since the early nineties has been playing around with the ABL or airborne laser idea. The government pumped billions in funding to make this the primary anti ballistic missile platform with a proposed fleet of 20 aircraft at 120 billion dollars each. Each aircraft would be a flying lab consisting of a megawatt producing COIL or Chemical Oxygen Iodine Laser and all of the necessary equipment to make it in to a missile killer!

Airborne Laser System (ABL) YAL 1A - Airforce Technology
http://earthops.org/lasers/coil.htm
https://www.photonics.com/Article.aspx?AID=18066
https://www.thisdayinaviation.com/tag/coil-chemical-oxygen-iodine-laser/
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF00694191?no-access=true

For a while now I been thinking on this principle of getting the most feasible power out of a chemical pumped laser. And it seems to me that there are more reactive chemicals out there that could produce the power needed to pump a laser. The thing of it is I really dont know which would be a good substitute for the Iodine. I think the Oxygen is a good starting point! I know many of you here on the forum know the science behind this a lot better than me and could come up with a workable solution.

I think that the Air Force is going at it the wrong way and needs to put a smaller chemical pumped laser with in a cluster to make a bigger better beam. With the advancements made in laser technology I think that they could get more bang for the buck if you excuse the pun this way! Or am I wrong in thinking this? Smaller Chemical Lasers could be used to pump a pellet of Deturium with in a confinement chamber that has a high electron gas in it to create a plasma that then could be used to make a laser beam! I know what I am think is probably Science Fiction But hey Thirty years ago computers were science fiction!

 

[RedCowboy]

From what I read the chemical lasers use the very toxic exhaust from basically a small rocket motor burn as a gain medium in a chamber much like an industrial co2 laser. It was mothballed in 2012 permanently.

Firestrike used amplifiers that were boxes of neodymium doped glass plates pumped by solid state or flash lamps that were stackable but large and haevy.

Firestrike High Power Solid State Laser Fires 105kW Beam


I thought the ytterbium doped fiber lasers such as HELLADS pretty much put chemical lasers out of the competition as well as the firestrike system, even the predator-C drone I read can carry a HELLADS system.

https://www.computerworld.com/artic...a-tests-laser-weapon-for-fighters-drones.html

 

[styropyro]

Chemical lasers are complicated...they operate sort of like jet engines and some need a supersonic gas jet to lase. I have some books on the subject and it is hilarious the kind of crazy stuff these scientists attempted to get working chemical and gas dynamic lasers. Think lots of explosives, feeding HV into uranium wire under pressurized oxygen, and some of the most toxic substances around.

In the COIL laser, the singlet oxygen and iodine make a great pair. Sure there are more reactive chemicals out there, but it is hard to beat the energy transfer from the excited oxygen to iodine to get lasing.

If there were a powerful chemical laser that would be easiest built by hobbyists, I'd bet on a HF laser from H2 and F2. In the old school experiments they initiated the reaction with a particle accelerator, but I bet you could initiate with a modern laser.

On a side note I think I have a design for a chemical laser that has never been built. If it works it won't be strong, but it would be awesome. Zero electricity needed. I'll post something if I get that working...

 

[diachi]

I'd bet on a HF laser from H2 and F2.

 

[vortish]

Chemical lasers are complicated...they operate sort of like jet engines and some need a supersonic gas jet to lase. I have some books on the subject and it is hilarious the kind of crazy stuff these scientists attempted to get working chemical and gas dynamic lasers. Think lots of explosives, feeding HV into uranium wire under pressurized oxygen, and some of the most toxic substances around.

In the COIL laser, the singlet oxygen and iodine make a great pair. Sure there are more reactive chemicals out there, but it is hard to beat the energy transfer from the excited oxygen to iodine to get lasing.

If there were a powerful chemical laser that would be easiest built by hobbyists, I'd bet on a HF laser from H2 and F2. In the old school experiments they initiated the reaction with a particle accelerator, but I bet you could initiate with a modern laser.

On a side note I think I have a design for a chemical laser that has never been built. If it works it won't be strong, but it would be awesome. Zero electricity needed. I'll post something if I get that working...

thanks for the lesson styro.....what about using a cvp and oxygen as a pair?:

 

[styropyro]

Hot HF gas spewing out of a high powered laser...what could possibly go wrong??

thanks for the lesson styro.....what about using a cvp and oxygen as a pair?:

Not sure what you mean by cvp. Chemical vapor...?

 

[Hemlock_Mike]

HF gas into the ozone layer??? OHNOOOOOOO
We're all dead.
HM

 

[Cyparagon]

I think that the Air Force is going at it the wrong way

I'm sorry... who are you? you know better than a team of some of the world's best engineers? You think your chemical laser idea that you spent 10 minutes on is somehow better than their multi-billion dollar project? You better have some wildly impressive credentials or evidence to back that up.