Did I kill my driver?

[VirtueViolater]

Ld+ red Ld- black

 

[Chrisbee]

I have a question about wiring the diode and driver where should i solder the negative wires of the diode,driver output and input?

A lot of the drivers say V+ or V- on them for the battery, and something like L+, or LD+ and - for the diode. The anode and cathode is diode specific though. So you'll need to look at the diode's spec sheet for that.

Also since you haven't mentioned it... Are you aware of the heat sensitivity of diodes? You NEED to leave the soldering iron contact time to a minimum, or you can fry the diode! Also, do you have any ESD protection? It would really suck if you ended up killing the diode, or another driver from one of these things. :beer:

 

[Poisonednumber]

Ah yes the diode came pre wired reason I ask about the negative wires is that I'v seen some ppl saying solder it strait to the host

 

[Garoq]

A lot of people like the stainless host for the looks but like others have said, the thermal conductivity is inferior to aluminum. I recommend this host for the higher power builds:

S4X Host Assembly

 

[VirtueViolater]

What Garoq said,
The heatsink and pill you have now will also work in it. They're really heavy, basically one huge heatsink

 

[Benm]

I did get the one with extended copper heat sink but if it does get too hot I may move it to a bigger host and use this one for a less power build

More copper inside will just increase the thermal mass of the entire thing. This is good if you want it for bursts of power, but does nothing to help if you want continous operation or anything near that.

Regardless of material there is just a fysical size/surface requirement that needs to be met for continous operation. Typically this would involve increasing surface area by using fins and such, unless the host was VERY large, or intended for underwater use (this applies mostly to things like LED diving lights but the principle is the same).

 

[VirtueViolater]

More copper inside will just increase the thermal mass of the entire thing. This is good if you want it for bursts of power, but does nothing to help if you want continous operation or anything near that.

Regardless of material there is just a fysical size/surface requirement that needs to be met for continous operation. Typically this would involve increasing surface area by using fins and such, unless the host was VERY large, or intended for underwater use (this applies mostly to things like LED diving lights but the principle is the same).

I agree,
That being said, most (if not all) hand helds are not intended for continous use

 

[Garoq]

Absolutely true. You can extend the duty cycle of a handheld with lots of copper and additional host mass, but ultimately you need active cooling or a large finned surface area to enable continuous operation.

 

[Poisonednumber]

Well my replacement driver comes in today I hope it all goes well I'v been waiting a long time to build my first laser best laser I'v had before this was some radio shack 10 mw green one.

 

[Poisonednumber]

Good news the new driver got it working learned my lesson the hard way don't hook battery's backward to ur laser. Thanks for all the replies and help, and thank you dtr and survival laser for the good quality parts.

Here's a pic:

 

[Garoq]

Good news the new driver got it working learned my lesson the hard way don't hook battery's backward to ur laser. Thanks for all the replies and help, and thank you dtr and survival laser for the good quality parts.

Here's a pic:

Good deal, glad to hear you got it sorted out!

 

[Benm]

I agree,
That being said, most (if not all) hand helds are not intended for continous use

It's hard to define what their eventual use will be.

I'd say things with momentary push buttons are not to be used continously, while things with clicky buttons that allows them to run all the time should be.

Designing a handheld laser for continous use (i.e. from full batteries to flat) is not terribly difficult at all, but the resulting product will be more bulky compared to a 'presentation pointer' of equal peak output.

With todays laser power outputs the presentation thing is a bit hard to justify, unless the point is to burn holes though the projection screen

 

[HJCBB]

So, I just fried my driver, too. I'm pissed at myself, because it was a careless accident, putting the batteries in backwards. But I'm also pissed that a $26 driver doesn't have a built-in reverse polarity protection for itself. It only takes one diode -a single $.02 diode. Anyone looking to use this driver should add one in, between the battery and the driver.

 

[Garoq]

So, I just fried my driver, too. I'm pissed at myself, because it was a careless accident, putting the batteries in backwards. But I'm also pissed that a $26 driver doesn't have a built-in reverse polarity protection for itself. It only takes one diode -a single $.02 diode!!! Anyone looking to use this driver should add one in, between the battery and the driver.

Sorry to hear about that. If it was an SL driver, honestly it hasn't been a major issue, but I will ask our circuit designer if he can include it in a future revision.

 

[HJCBB]

Thank you Garoq. I don't think it is one of yours. I purchased it from DTR, and it really was a great driver otherwise! It is (was) a 4A Super X-Drive(SXD-V3). I've read a few posts, after the fact, warning not to reverse polarity on the input. But how many times have we all put batteries into something backwards? (I know, it's a laser, not a flashlight...)

 

[HJCBB]

I just got a really nice email from DTR's Laser Shop. He explained that the driver doesn't have a reverse protection (blocking) diode in order to maximize the run time from the batteries (and because it is so tiny, there isn't room for more components on the board.) This makes sense, but personally, I will wire one in anyway. The little driver is so nice, that I am more than willing to lose a little run time to protect it from my own carelessness.