Clear skies to you

[smallfreak]

Mine is well over 100 mW though. It is still single mode so the divergence is great. I think it would make a great star pointer as Andrew has stated here. Mine has a very visible beam in the night sky. :yh:

I'm quite confident that "well over 100mW" would get me serious troubles in no time if I would try to poke holes into the sky with it.

A real eye catcher.

 

[paul1598419]

By "well over" I meant 120 mW and it is not high enough in power to cause people to see it from a distance. It is right in the intensity that I would want to point at stars at night. These are all my lower power laser pointers which don't get to the level of Class IV lasers like most of my others do. They are not particularly visible in lighted areas like a well lit room.

 

[Benm]

It shouldn't be a big problem indeed, if you point something like that up in the air you can clearly see the beam, but if you point it straight up chances are someone even a few hundred meters away from you will hardly see anything at all.

Under typical conditions the scatter is strongest near-forward (as in the laser pointing at your face but not quite hitting you), and (near) aft, i.e. when holding the laser.

Sideways scattering is usually much less visible.

This does change when you get situations like haze/fog/smog but those would hinder astronomy greatly anyway.

 

[smallfreak]

Quick status update:

The pointer I ordered did arrive today. Works as advertized. I cannot measure the power, but it sticks a bright green bar into the sky, clearly visible from behind. More than enough power to point at the stars. I will ask my wife for help in a dark night to judge how big the visibility radius might be.

I didn't check divergence, but it is unnoticable for star pointing so it does not really matter. Maybe I do measure this one day. I first need a really, really black target that consumes most of the light. Or some propper safety goggles. Or both. The spot is uncomfortable to look at, even on black velvet.

It has a good, round beam profile with just a small ammount of stray light. Probably because of inner reflections in the optics.

I definitely won't use it as a real pointing device in a meeting as it certainly outshines everything I would try to point at and freighten my audicence. A freak toy.

And that is meant to be <50mW. :undecided:

I wonder what I should make with the old pen. Take it apart? Try to salvage some parts? Replace the dead interior against some other cool module?
I'll see.

I will ask my questions in the proper area.
And I will have to extend my footer, i guess, to show that I'm no virgin anymore. :crackup:

 

[brendon7358]

I know you already bought your laser and your satisfied with it but you should check out my thread on lpm'd lasers. I tested them all for power output and IR output and they are all fairly low, maybe you could buy a few for friends? I'll give you a discount if you want a few of them. I also sell cheap goggles that I tested as well and are safe to use if you want to explore more powerful lasers or even for using the <100mW lasers indoors they would be perfect. A good pair of goggles is important for any laser hobbyist, just remember if you take apart a green laser, very few goggles block both green and IR light.