KTP and DPSS

[rhd]

It could be, I had considered that awhile back but Nd:YAG is notoriously finicky compared to Nd:YVO4, which is why the vast majority of green lasers now use YVO4. 473nm is generated by doubling Nd:YAG, and it's fairly stable but highly inefficient.. The 1319nm line in YAG isn't as strong as the 946nm line as I recall and neither is nearly as strong as the obvious 1064nm line.

Plus there's the timing of their appearance.. 594nm lasers were around in hobbyist hands for a good while before 589nm became popular, and it became popular due to the higher powers over 594nm that are possible. I see a technological development there, something became practical with common components that wasn't previously. 594nm is a very inefficient process, as is 473nm generation. For summing Nd:YAG to be used for 589nm would surprise me a little, but it's not impossible. To me 589nm has YVO4 written all over it.. certainly could be wrong though.

What are YVO4's lines? I know of 1064, and I think 915 and 1340 are there also. I don't know how you could double any of that to get 589.... yet 1064 and 1319 sum perfectly to get 589.

That's too much of a coincidence, so I'm sticking with my original answer. I would be willing to put my money on 589 being a sum of 1064 and 1319, not a doubling of anything in YVO4.

EDIT: And you mentioned 594 predating 589. Isn't 594 a summing of 1064 and 1342? In which case, the "technological development" that you mentioned would be as simple as them having found that the 1319 line instead of the 1342 line was usable to achieve 589 instead of 594.

 

[ElektroFreak]

Actually after reading some more I agree with you.. just dug up some old info that has the relative powers of Nd:Yag lines and if you're summing even two weak lines then you should get decent power output at 589nm if conditions are right.. I'm a little surprised at the stability of 589nm lasers given that they're using YAG, but my experience there is not firsthand since I don't own one. My 473nm lasers are all pretty stable except for some amplitude noise at around 5kHz or so, but they're so very inefficient.

 

[rhd]

Actually after reading some more I agree with you.. just dug up some old info that has the relative powers of Nd:Yag lines and if you're summing even two weak lines then you should get decent power output at 589nm if conditions are right.. I'm a little surprised at the stability of 589nm lasers given that they're using YAG, but my experience there is not firsthand since I don't own one. My 473nm lasers are all pretty stable except for some amplitude noise at around 5kHz or so, but they're so very inefficient.

If that is the case, it would be remarkable if they could sum 1319 and 1123 from ND:YAG, to get 606.5 nm output

Wavelength to RGB / HEX Calculator

Nice looking colour

 

[Sigurthr]

You guys are all making me lust after 589/594nm now. Thank you very much, you've pretty much given my tax return a death sentence.

 

[Hiemal]

This thread turned out a lot more insightful than I had hoped.