Miss the old DIY red lasers...so I built one

[styropyro]

I just made a video of this laser, mostly on how I made it but I threw in some burning clips too.

YouTube - Powerful Homemade Burning Laser Built From Computer Parts

 

[jarrod694]

That's an extremely good laser. You did a very good job on this - and the setup looks good in my opinion.

I have a red DVD burner laser, but it won't burn anything unless it is focused. Your laser appears to perform very well indeed.

Red will always be the color of a classic science fiction "ray gun", in my mind. Red surrounded by blue is also quite lovely.

I enjoy building lasers regardless of the wavelength. There are some really cool IR lasers out there. Many high performance lasers come in IR and NIR wavelengths. I built a ruby laser that produces a visible red beam of pulsed light. It will burn holes through hard metal objects like screwdrivers and coins. Here is a set with some really cool action shots using this laser:

Ruby Laser in Action - a set on Flickr

 

[x90z75ek]

Nice looking laser! I'm currently working on a red laser build myself and it's good to see they are still popular.

 

[kingdave2357]

I love red, just as popular as ever for me, here ill post some pics of my latest build:
Chrome Pocket Mini
V5 Flex set to 500mA
Normal Output: 303mW with 650nm G1

Sorry for the crappy cell phone pics but I cant get my good camera's pics to upload to the forum...

 

[styropyro]

That's an extremely good laser. You did a very good job on this - and the setup looks good in my opinion.

I have a red DVD burner laser, but it won't burn anything unless it is focused. Your laser appears to perform very well indeed.

Red will always be the color of a classic science fiction "ray gun", in my mind. Red surrounded by blue is also quite lovely.

I enjoy building lasers regardless of the wavelength. There are some really cool IR lasers out there. Many high performance lasers come in IR and NIR wavelengths. I built a ruby laser that produces a visible red beam of pulsed light. It will burn holes through hard metal objects like screwdrivers and coins. Here is a set with some really cool action shots using this laser:

Ruby Laser in Action - a set on Flickr

That ruby laser is sweet! AWESOME pictures, don't those lase near 700nm? I wish I had the experience to try a build like that, even after 5 years in the laser hobby I'm mostly trapped in the pointer world.

I love red, just as popular as ever for me, here ill post some pics of my latest build:
Chrome Pocket Mini
V5 Flex set to 500mA
Normal Output: 303mW with 650nm G1

Sorry for the crappy cell phone pics but I cant get my good camera's pics to upload to the forum...

You're really pushing that thing at 500mA, nice! With how cheap LOCs are these days I'll have to do some more builds.

 

[kingdave2357]

You're really pushing that thing at 500mA, nice! With how cheap LOCs are these days I'll have to do some more builds.

Thanks! Yeah I wanted this to be my 'power' red build, but I was honestly expecting more mW, greenmechanic has one at 510mA and he is getting 380mW out of his.
I prefer LCCs to LOCs, just had better luck with the diode, and I never had an LCC LED on me yet, even after running them at ridiculous currents, I had one in my maxsink close to 600mA for a few mins before. And my chrome build has a good few hours on it already and still strong!

 

[FrozenOver]

i just found this forum not to long ago, i have a 50mW green laser in shipping. i wanted to get into the DIY part of the laser world and the first thing i wanted to do was make a high powered red pointer, but idk where to find the instructions

 

[Seoul_lasers]

That ruby laser is sweet! AWESOME pictures, don't those lase near 700nm? I wish I had the experience to try a build like that, even after 5 years in the laser hobby I'm mostly trapped in the pointer world.


You're really pushing that thing at 500mA, nice! With how cheap LOCs are these days I'll have to do some more builds.

Right, a ruby laser AlO2 doped Cr will lase around 694nm - 700nm or to our eyes that is a VERY deep wine/red colour.
personally I have never seen one in action other than the ones that some members have here.
I have built a dye laser before using a BIG camera flash. that worked. Output was yellow green.

 

[blackspirit]

Nice work! I just built a red laser yesterday thinking the same thing. Burns through a u5 jiffy box in 2-3 seconds, lol my new fav red. LOC, 420mA

 

[Benm]

Red is by no means obsolete... its just the new limitimg factor now.

Blue used to be very expensive, but that has changed with the 445 diodes providing serious power levels by now. Buildng powerful reds will be the challenge again!

 

[flogged]

Nice Build! I like the big heatsink block you've mounted the diode in. Definitely a true 'DIY' with parts you happened to have laying about.

You're not the only one that still prefers red. It's my favorite laser color, followed by green.
BluRay and 440nm are fun but rather eye raping, IMO.

I'd really like to see some yellow and orange LDs.. maybe someday.

Not to thread-jack, but here are some images I just took of one of the first DIY lasers I built. It's still going strong after at least two years, with > 150 hours of use I reckon.

It's not a clean build, but functional. I'm using a Sony '16x' DVD diode (ordered from StoneTek in 2007). I'm only driving it with 125mA of current, which is probably why it's still kicking. I'm guessing it's 80-100 mW. I'm using the 'DDL' circuit as the driver (LM317T based, note I bypassed the potentiometer for a fixed resistor circuit). Got the driver parts from radioshack. I'm using a Meredith acrylic lens and mounting block. Get a real tight focus with this setup, so it burns better than you might imagine. I thermal glued the diode into place with silver epoxy. No duty cycle, I can leave this thing on for hours (and I have) no problem. Sometimes I use it as a nightlight.

Last image, doing a ceiling bounce in the bathroom.

I keep this laser under the bed and it's what I reach for when I need a coherent photon fix. I feel safe using it without goggles, and it's plenty bright, especially at night. I used to like my 635nm, but I've been using this one more and more as it's brighter.

It's like.. you get a really powerful laser, but then in order to use it safely you've got to wear goggles so it looks no brighter than a 5mW keychain laser. That's why I like this DIY.

 

[Xplorer877]

I like my LOC builds too. I don't usually value one wavelength over the other. I like my whole collection of wavelengths in it's entirety.

-Tony

 

[rockz]

Wait, how do you get 7v from a PC PSU? Mine only has +5, +12, +3, and the negatives carry too low of a current to be useful.

 

[RandomDigit]

Voltage is the potential difference so if your PSU has say -12v, -5v, -3v, GND, 3v, 5v, and 12v. you can get a lot of different voltages you just pick two rails and find the potential difference, say 5v and 12v and you get 7v. Hope that helps.

 

[rockz]

Wait, so if both 5v and 12v can provide 20A, if i use them to make 7v, it will still provide 20A? Also I don't see how 2 positive rails could make a power source, but I'll try it.

Thanks

 

[TheRandomDigit]

yep sure will just make sure you use the lower voltage as the ground or negative terminal and it'll work.