Welcome to Laser Pointer Forums - discuss green laser pointers, blue laser pointers, and all types of lasers

Buy Site Supporter Role (remove some ads) | LPF Donations

Links below open in new window

FrozenGate by Avery

Coherent Radius 405 inside and out

C

cev1

0
Joined
Apr 14, 2011
Messages
23
Points
0
I acquired a couple of Coherent Radius 405 units off ebay. They were apparently surplussed since the diodes had reduced to LEDs. I plugged in a new 50mW rated 405 LD from stock, and I get something like 5 mW.

Here are a couple of pictures:

IMG_1586_small.JPG


IMG_1587_small.JPG


Breakdown of the unit was pretty easy. Remove all the screws (including three under the stickers), pry off the ends, slide the assembly out. You can see the "PWR ADJ" pot on the front of the first image. I tuned the output a bit, from 4 to 6 mW. It is not accessible when the unit is built.

I can take it below threshold by reducing the 12V input voltage to about 6V. I haven't done much else yet, but I can keep poking at it if there is any interest.

Any ideas what the jumpers might do?

CEV
 
  • Like
Reactions: ARG





Does the LCD display anything while the laser is running?

Trevor
 
The LCD is an ENM T1101AB. It just displays the run time, 6602.6 hours on this guy. That's not very long for an LD to have gone bad (The build date on the sticker is 2009). I think this is an OEM unit that would have gone into an interferometer.
 
Last edited:
These were explained to me as being used in blood sample interferometers or something like that. I just acquired one that appears at first glance to still be lasing. Don't have any lenses with me to expand the output right now, but they are cute little units in HeNe style cylinders.

Thanks for the pics! The aperture wheel on mine is very gunky and hard to turn, but now that I've found pics of disassembly, I am less afraid to take apart to clean up this mechanical shutter.

edit: mine came with the PSU :-) A very simple plug and play brick. I'll try to remember to post up pinout of PSU.

Question: where is the collimating lens located, in the purple endcap? If I remove the aperture cap to repair the aperture shutter, will I have trouble getting it back to factory focus?
 
Last edited:
It is trivial to remove the purple part. There are three screws around the edge, Then just a little bit pf prying. There is no risk since it not attached to anything of importance in the device (the same is true for the back cover, although it took a lot more prying since there is no edge to grasp).
radius_405_013_small.JPG


The lens is bolted to the two holes on either side of the diode, clearly visible in the second pic, above. While I did not get a PSU, they are cheap enough for me to buy one for my purposes. Pinouts are all listed in the datasheet that can be downloaded from Coherent.
 
Last edited:
Now that is cool! Any chance at a close up of the electronics? I love to see the amount of engineering that went into these.
May also help with figuring out what the jumpers do :)
 
I remember seeing those awhile back on feebay. I was thinking meh a non working 405 boring. Damn I was wrong they look cool and much bigger than I recall. Nice score.
 
Thanks ceV1!

Mine still works fine, but interesting to see it labeled Universal Combo Tec. Perhaps would be a nice host for other diodes of different powers too. Also interesting to see the existence of two trimpots labeled power adj and temp adj.

I managed to get that aperture housing out, loosened the shutter screw just a smidge. Didn't want to lube it with something that would fog up the lens. Now I can actually open and close the shutter without sawing a groove into my thumb :wave:
 
Sorry, took me a whole two weeks to finally bring the metric allen keys back to my desk. The yellow plate is aluminum, just like the rest of the housing. It is hard to tell from the photos, but the brass heat sink is spaced by a couple of mm from the yellow plate. All the wires pass through this gap to the back. The leads are very permanently potted into the heat sink with epoxy.

As for ESD, you can see the big ground strap in the first picture above.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.





Back
Top