Melles Griot Co2 Laser

[Helios]

^^^ You should be safe with most any type of clear plastic safety goggles, that wavelength cannot pass through regular glass or plastic!:beer: ( At least very quickly! )

Yup thats why CO2 lasers can even cut mirrors :beer: Good ole $1 safety glasses are just fine but obviously stay clear of the beam!

The danger of eye damage is pretty small with a CO2 laser since the lens of your eye will not focus the wavelength on your retina. Again though all bets are off if your in the path of the beam.

 

[james1095]

Yeah any glasses you can find will almost fully absorb the wavelength from a CO2 laser, but enough power is available that it won't take long to burn a hole through them if you manage to get directly in the beam. Also it's completely invisible deep IR so the first clue that you've been hit will be smoke or flames erupting from whatever the spot lands on!

A cool thing about CO2 lasers is that if you put clear glass in the beam it will absorb it and heat that spot to incandescence. Hit a glass jar and then shut off the beam and often it will crack a nice neat round hole when the spot cools.

 

[heruursciences]

The pins in the back are a safety interlock loop and a thermal switch sensor, they are unimportant for the laser to run if you make sure you have water cooling the tube. If you intend to run the laser untended for a while, by all means use them.

 

[532 with Envy]

Thank you all for your help!
I have handed this off to aryntha, I just have too many ideas swimming around to take on another.(...as well as the groaning of my wallet)
I have faith that he will get it up and running so that all here may learn just a bit more about CO2 lasers.

Keep up the experimenting and, as always, have good safe fun!!:beer:

 

[N3JQD]

I realize this is an old post, but, I may be of some help. As a ham (amateur radio) enthusiast I run into Linear Amps all the time. PM me if you want. My LPF name is my callsign.

 

[vk2fro]

Only by a month N3JQD

Also a ham LOL and I have a few amps sitting around here, but none of them are 27mhz (or will go there without modifications)