Man do I have a data dump for you:
Kevin at Starlight-Photonics drew this for me showing the Spectra-Physics ZLM Z-fold beam path. I just received this photo and drawing yesterday:
I bought the other two ZLM 1064 nm heads he had last month, want to do the same thing. Recently I have been able to find 40 watt 805-811 nm Coherent FAP800 lasers for under 200 dollars, they pop up every now and then but usually at twice that price. Look for modules which are made for Coherent Avia lasers, I can pass on three fleabay sellers who get them from time to time buying surplus from Coherent.
Here's a photo of the output pattern of the last FAP800 I bought which had some dark fibers, the seller replaced it for free though letting me keep this one. I just received the replacement yesterday and have not checked it yet. I used the back side of a laser power meter head as a power dump to take a photo of the beam produced by this FAP, you can see the dark side on the lower right where there was little to no output from those fibers. Even at a fairly low output (2.1 VDC @ 12.6 amps) without a heat sink I had to be quick taking this photo so the unit could not get too warm.
For this photo I used a short glass cylinder with the beam shot through it end to end in front of the FAP output, not a collimator. When using a collimator you would not see the pattern this wide so close to the FAP, with a collimator you would need to shoot the beam on a wall or something 15 feet away to allow the beam to expand enough (due to its high divergence) to see the individual fiber outputs:
Note: On the back side of the LPM head those small dark spots are threaded screw holes. In this photo you can see 14 bright spots from the good fibers, five of them on the bottom right side dim or completely dark.
For the above photo showing the FAP800 output, a small glass cylinder was mounted in front of the fiber output with the beam shot through it end to end, not a collimator. When using a collimator you would not see the pattern this wide close to the output of the FAP and would likely need to shoot the beam at a wall about 15 feet away to allow the beam to expand enough (due to its high divergence) to see the individual fiber outputs. The photo taken with an iPhone which has an IR filter in it. Regardless of the filter, the power output from the FAP was high enough at a few watts for the IR spot to be detected.
Buying surplus is the only way for most hobbyists to afford these units but sometimes they have a few dark fibers, the last one I bought had about 1/3 of them dark which is probably caused by burned out fibers or perhaps bad diodes in the bar or diode array inside the FAP but with the pattern dark all on one side like that I suspect a fiber problem. Due to this kind of failure being fairly common among surplus finds, see if you can get the seller to guarantee no dark fibers so you can return it if you don't like it. To see if they are dark put a collimator in front of the FAP SMA output connector and use a camera which is sensitive enough to 800 nm to view it on a surface.
Here's a photo of a setup to see the dark fibers I did a few years ago, this uses one of those SMA collimators out of a surplus 473 nm medical laser projected onto a wall about 15 feet away where you can see one of the fibers is dark in the bottom right side of the beam pattern. The photo against the lens face was taken at very low output power just above the lasing threshold, but far enough above it to light all of the fibers, if they were good. The photo taken of the pattern on the wall was at a few watts output:
Below, the 12.7 mm diameter PCX SMA collimator I used with the FAP for the above photo. The lens in it has no AR coating I can see and is not a good choice for use at full power output, one member had the output of his FAP800 burn due to back reflection.
Only thing is when buying these FAP modules surplus is sometimes they have dark fibers, the last one I bought had about 1/3 of the fibers dark which is probably caused by bad diodes in the bar array inside the FAP and why it ended up on the surplus junk pile. Due to this problem being fairly common, if you get one from a surplus seller try to see if they will guarantee no dark fibers so you can return it if you don't like it. To see if they are dark put a collimator in front of the FAP SMA output connector and use a camera which is sensitive enough to 800 nm to view it on a surface.
Below, modules which look like this are often 805.5 to 811 nm and were made for lasers like the Avia with a nice TEC inside to keep the FAP at the correct temperature to produce 808 nm.
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Fiber cables here too, this man is retired but made these for a living when he was last employed:
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Is this FAP trash or ?
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Coherent-FAP-800-813nm-40W-Laser-Diode-Fiber-Array-Package-/174040896502 - I don’t know this seller.
Edit: Here's another thread on powering a FAP:
https://laserpointerforums.com/thre...fap800-precautions-and-driving-advice.104635/
