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FrozenGate by Avery

How much mA did You drive your first BR at?

5

50Freestyle

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This poll is for your first BR with an 803t diode please. This is mostly for my own curiosity. I'll be making my first Blu-Ray soon and i've been told to drive it around 120mA. Just wanted to see what everyone else drove their first Blu-Ray at.

Thanks, :)
 





127ma is what it was driven at initially. Now its happily running at 143ma :) Fun laser hehe


brtaman
 
Hmm, IIRC it was on 127ma for around 2 weeks of relatively heavy use and on 143ma for about a week and half, so basically around a month of usage. I believe that 143ma is still a relatively safe/conservative current to run a diode at. But its also very nice to have a 803t running at 127ma, however 803t output varies so much that results at given currents are very mixed.


Thanks
brtaman
 
No problem man.

Why are you asking, getting ready for a DIY blu-ray laser :) ?



brtaman
 
Mine was about 100mA, it was before we knew that we could drive them harder.
 
150mA.

I've changed it to 115mA for an hour or so, then back to 150. I don't use it all that much tho, IDK why :S
 
No problem man.

Why are you asking, getting ready for a DIY blu-ray laser ?



brtaman
Click to expand...

You guessed it! It'll be my first DIY :D

Mine was about 100mA, it was before we knew that we could drive them harder.
Click to expand...

How long has it lived so far? Or How long did it live before it died?

150mA.

I've changed it to 115mA for an hour or so, then back to 150. I don't use it all that much tho, IDK why :S
Click to expand...

You still enjoy it though, don't you? Its cool to know that you built that laser with your own two hands :)
 
I made them about a month and a half ago, and they are still running fine. Surprisingly I haven't blown one of these yet, and I've messed with four.
 
styropyro said:
I made them about a month and a half ago, and they are still running fine. Surprisingly I haven't blown one of these yet, and I've messed with four.
Click to expand...

Nice, what kind of host are you using? Is it heatsinked well?
 
My first bluray ran at 38mA, since it was a KES-400A diode from a PS3 and that's really the max they can take.

My first 803t ran at some 90mA, since we weren't sure what they were capable of and there'd been some reports of people blowing them at 150mA...

I'm running my current 803t at 125mA and have had no problems with it. These are capable of running at upwards of 190-200mA with what seems to be a significantly reduced lifespan... If these are the Sharp diodes that people suspect they are, they're rated for some 100mW CW, and at that level they should achieve something like 8000 hours... A member here, climbak, ran one without any proper heatsink at 100-130 (iirc) mA for about a month solid with no breaks.

The lifetime of the diode will be shortened in the long run if you drive these above 100mA, though they can last many weeks of running them for half an hour a day at 175-200mA before they start to degrade... I'd probably never set mine higher than 150mA though just to be safe.

Another thing to consider is these diodes are *very* different from one diode to the next, and these general recommendations may or may not be applicable for your specific diode... they vary wildly in power output and lifetime... they're meant to be running at some 50-70mA or so in their application, and anything above that they act somewhat unpredictably.
 
50Freestyle said:
[quote author=styropyro link=1217354384/0#9 date=1217377975]I made them about a month and a half ago, and they are still running fine. Surprisingly I haven't blown one of these yet, and I've messed with four.
Click to expand...

Nice, what kind of host are you using? Is it heatsinked well?[/quote]
One's in a little boxy pointer (too lazy to try to fit it in something small ;D), one is sitting in a module wanting to be turned into a labby, and the other two I'm selling cause I need some cash in my paypal.
 
Plugged mine into a rckstar 150ma max adjustable driver.  The pot is very sensitive, and hard to get it to stop at the highest point - it goes right back past to about 40ma.  So, I got mine to an indicated 141ma without spending too much efforet on squeeaing the last drops out of it at the time.  CapZapped it 24 hours later with a dry joint on the LD  :'(  

Replacement parts and 200ma drivers on the way  8-)
 
I drove my first PHR at 90mA too. Now i'm setting most to 125mA, but for myself i use much higher currents experimentally, often with bad consequences.

I'm driving my latest blu ray at 182mA, but this one won't die, because it's a different diode.. ;)

Otherwise, i heatsink all of them enough, that it takes an hour of being left on, to reach body temperature, even at currents of 180mA.



But if you're looking for a safe current for a PHR, no one really knows yet.. They can live at 190mA or they can die at 125mA. It's too soon to tell what is safe for sure.

When 16x reds appeared, people were MUCH more careful, than we are with these. I drove my first 16x red at 270mA, and i was told it's crazy, and that i should set it to 150mA, or 200mA max. Now we know, they can take almost 300mA and put out almost 200mW.. The latest models even more.

I really hope these diodes turn out to be as tough as reds. Otherwise, if you're making your lasers yourself, i don't think replacing a diode is such a big deal. ;)
 
I haven't mad mine yet, but I'm seting it at 100mA with my flexdrive. I'm yet to find a host, though
 
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