Green laser, Crown or LZSK?

[InfinitusEquitas]

^^^Read Jayrob's thread, there is a ton of posts about g1 vs regular 3 element lens.

 

[Cel]

I did, but wanted to hear more opinions.

 

[Dam]

You should expect 3,5-4mm beam diameter with 1,5-1,8mrad of divergence from cheap high power green lasers. They are often mode hooping, mode drifting beam splitted and you should get used to this otherwise you want spend >1500$ for CNI, laserglow or optotronics lasers. You will be happy when you will have "TEM00" beam in cheap laser. You will have way much better beam in a cheap 2xAAA ~100mW laser pointer.. I have 100mW cheap pointer which has 1,5mm beam and 0,9mrad of divergence. But I'm happy with my +500mW green "flashlight-laser" becouse the beam is really powerful and everyone I know says "h**y s**t" when I turn on the power.

 

[tsteele93]

IIRC the website says >350mW for both of them.

Divergence and beam diameter are a crap shoot. If you're concerned with that head over laserglow and optotronics... be prepared to pay though.

I have a 400mW crown that is putting out 296mW.

So consider that...

 

[tsteele93]

You should expect 3,5-4mm beam diameter with 1,5-1,8mrad of divergence from cheap high power green lasers. They are often mode hooping, mode drifting beam splitted and you should get used to this otherwise you want spend >1500$ for CNI, laserglow or optotronics lasers. You will be happy when you will have "TEM00" beam in cheap laser. You will have way much better beam in a cheap 2xAAA ~100mW laser pointer.. I have 100mW cheap pointer which has 1,5mm beam and 0,9mrad of divergence. But I'm happy with my +500mW green "flashlight-laser" becouse the beam is really powerful and everyone I know says "h**y s**t" when I turn on the power.

So true! I was under the mistaken impression that greens had great specs. But once you get into higher powers it takes an expensive build to get good beam specs.

 

[InfinitusEquitas]

I have a 400mW crown that is putting out 296mW.

So consider that...

You could RMA it... too much of a pain the a$$ imo, but you could.

Seems to be luck of the draw.

My first o-like 400mW was also a dud... but the replacement peaks over 500mW each time

I have a feeling the first time lasers are not tested very well before being sent.

I suspect the way o-like operates is the lasers come in to them already tested and binned. They may or may not test again, but the lasers just sit until being sent out.

On first order they are only clicked on... green light, and they are good to go as far as they are concerned.

On RMA's they probably actually test out the units being sent.

I know o-like will honor the exchange, but for 50mW, idk if it's worth the hassle and the wait.

 

[tsteele93]

You could RMA it... too much of a pain the a$$ imo, but you could.

Will they? I bought it from Clif to save shipping time, so I am not the original buyer.

Also, I just placed a large (for me anyway) order of about $500 on Sunday night and stupidly paid for DHL and haven't heard a THING from them other than an automated email.

Paypal ays they did accept the $ though!

I guess the culture is just different... If it were optotronics or someone here I'd have heard from them with tracking numbers, etc...

Frustrating. :gun:

 

[InfinitusEquitas]

Yeah, o-like can be slow to ship out... no question about that. Never pay for express with them.

I don't think they would honor the exchange from you, but if Clif contacts them and asks to RMA and then you send it... should be ok, if Clif agrees to do it.

IMO not worth the hassle over 50mW.