Well. I got the second part of my order.
I am now disappointed.
The HL405- 500mW is the only laser from the second batch I'm kind of pleased with. It starts off at ~660mW and drops steadily from there, just as I have observed from any 405nm laser.
This laser would be fine, except the LED that indicates that the circuit is complete does not work. It turn red when the laser is actually on, but does not turn green when it is simply in the "On" position, with both the plug inserted, and the key turned to on position.
The box it came in, the spine is also broken. I don't really care about the boxes, but that's 3 out of 8 total, and another straw on the came's back.
The HL650- 300mW is underspec. It peaks at 280mW very briefly, and drops fairly fast, on a slower response LPM I do not believe you would see above 250mW. The output is also rather strange... I was expecting to see a nice round dot, as we see with the simple 660 loc builds on here. Instead the dot is actually more of a line, and not focused to infinity when screwed all the way in.
There is also some splash, but nothing too extreme. I would be ok with the power too except that the beam is freaking THICK. With the power density being lower, the beam is really a let down.
Next the HL460- 100mW. Unfortunately the best peak that this laser reaches is 90mW. This is while the laser is cold, and power does drop.
This is my first single mode 445, but I'm also kind of surprised by both the beam and the dot. My expectation was for a clean round dot, this laser being sold as single mode, and for a nice thin beam. Instead the beam profile is IDENTICAL to that of a very underdriven a/m140. Maybe I'm missing something, and someone with other single mode 445/450nm lasers can chime in? Certainly it's not what I was expecting. :undecided:
The LED on this one is also not working properly. Turning red when lasing, but not turning green when in "armed/on" position.
Last, the Gift a
100mW 635nm Single Mode Laser, in an HL host.
The "good" news, it's hitting a ~180-190mW peak.
The BAD news. It's not single mode. It's the UGLY dot we're familiar with from the mitsu 300mW and 500mW. I'm posiive looking at the dot that it is an underdriven 300mW.
I'm not sure, maybe Kevin sent me the wrong laser by mistake? I was really looking forward to seeing a single mode 635nm laser. My exact words were "For the gift please ask Kevin to send the HL638 as we discussed
Really can't wait to see a nice single mode 638, AND 450 (60ish
).
"
While at it, I retested the
HL532, 300mW, from the second GB.
It started off at right around 500mW, with about 60mW of IR. At the one minute mark it was down to 380mW with about 150mW of IR, putting it well underspec.
Last I again test the
HL532 150mW from the original GB. The results are consistent with what I saw with it last time. Instead of
quickly hitting a peak of ~260-280mW and being somewhat erratic, and dropping slowly in power, it now takes a good minute to reach a peak of ~180mW. Unfortunately 30-40mW of that is IR. While it hasn't degraded during a 1 week period, and is kind of on spec, it's troubling that the laser could be losing power/degrading.
TL,DR; -
10 lasers in total, four overspec, and great. One with a minor issue, one with a potentially major issue (degradation), and three underspec. :undecided:
