Couple Questions

[Geek Tripp]

What's up everyone. I'm really liking the idea of lasers and I find it really interesting how they can burn small things with just a beam of light.

The thing is that I can't really find anywhere that a person actually builds the laser from the ground up. Is it possible to build everything like the mirror array and everything, or does it require extremely expensive equipment?

I don't know. I figured it would be really cool to make every part completely by hand. I'm sure it wouldn't be all that powerful, but it sounds fun to me lol.

 

[Razako]

It would be extremely hard to build everything by hand. Probably impossible to build the diodes and lenses without extremely precision equipment.

 

[diachi]

It would be extremely hard to build everything by hand. Probably impossible to build the diodes and lenses without extremely precision equipment.

This.

You can build some things somewhat from scratch, if you count using off the shelf components as building something from scratch that is. You're not going to be making high end dielectric mirrors at home any time soon though, that's for sure.

Look at Sam's Laser FAQ - There are plenty of instructions for plenty of different DIY lasers on there.

Also - you could post all of these questions to one thread ...

 

[H2Oxide]

You can build N2 lasers completely from scratch.

You can also make a variety of different CW gas and alkali vapor lasers from scratch if you have a glass lathe. The only thing you would have trouble making yourself is the mirrors.

If you were really intent on doing everything yourself you could pick up a used e-beam evaporator for a couple thousand.