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ArcticMyst Security by Avery

Multiline argon goodness (many pics) (updated 8/14)

Joined
Sep 22, 2010
Messages
1,358
Points
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A little background first...

Towards the end of June I came down with a bad case of laserus needas anotheritis and decided the best way to cure it was with one of the nice multiline argon lasers that daguin was selling.

I know I'm preaching to the choir but daguin was great to deal with. Even with family in town he still answered all my PMs within 24 hours even though I told him don't worry about it. Everything was well packed and arrived intact. If you've never seen an Argon laser beam in person it's a sight to behold. After about 45 minutes the room where I had it setup was feeling like a sauna so I shut it down. Later that evening I fired it up again to take pics when it happened. *BANG* To make a long story short the cable clamp that help the umbilical came loose and contacted one of the filament/cathode leads causing one helluva an arc followed by one helluva bang. Turns out it fried the power supply and after talking with daguin he gave me a very nice deal on another power supply. As you can probably guess the laser still worked (why else would I be posting this thread) once the new supply arrived. I was very lucky that when it shorted it shorted directly to ground and not say to the laser housing.

Ok enough rambling on to the pics. :D



2011-07-12_10-16-40pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr

The inside of a box style JDS Uniphase argon laser showing the tube. Unlike an HeNe there's not much to see tubewise.



2011-07-13_11-43-55pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr

You may have to look at the full sized on flickr but if you look at the clamp under the yellow wires you can see part of the scorch mark. After tightening the hell out of the ring that holds the clamp in place I made an insulator pad out of 4 layers of 600V rated electrical tape to prevent it from happening again.



2011-07-25_09-58-14pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr

The five lines it produces at idle (4A).



2011-07-25_10-01-01pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr

Six of the seven lines it can produce at 10A, full power. Also seen is the cyan main beam.


2011-07-25_10-03-57pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr

A better shot of the 6 lines.



2011-07-29_10-27-03pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr

ML Argon and 473nm blue.


2011-07-29_10-26-30pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr

ML Argon and 473nm blue.



2011-07-29_10-35-22pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr

Ah S#!T crossed the beams! ;)


As seen above a CD works decently to split the beam into its individual lines but as daguin said a good diffraction mirror is worth its weight in gold. hakzaw1 offered to sell me an extra one he had along with some other goodies and after seeing the results that others had with the same one I jumped on the opportunity. Along with the diffraction mirror he also included a piece of normal polished mirror, a piece of diffraction grating, two pieces of lumia glass, and a couple laser warning stickers.


2011-08-06_10-03-53pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr

The main beam is the rightmost bottom one.



2011-08-06_10-10-46pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr

A couple of the lines don't show up in this picture unfortunately.



Some shots of my setup using the mirror and one of the pieces of lumia glass.


2011-08-07_09-34-53pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr


2011-08-07_09-39-10pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr


2011-08-07_09-50-16pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr


2011-08-07_09-50-16pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr

Playing with the focal point a bit.


2011-08-07_09-52-59pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr

The white thing hanging from the mirror is a small piece of tissue to keep the clip from scratching the mirror.


Now this has me baffled. For several of the pictures I took I was between 12 and 18" from the beam and/or mirror so to keep fram taking a ~80mw beam to the face (it was running at ~8A) I wore my glasses from OEM Laser Systems. While looking towards the laser I noticed I could still see the beam and part of the pattern on the wall. This shouldn't happen because the glasses I have are rated for OD3+ for 385-540nm which covers all the visible light lines of an argon. I thought maybe it was the 363.8nm UV line causing the wall to fluoresce but that doesn't explain why I could see the beam coming from the laser since that's below what people can see. They're also rated at OD5+ for 180-395nm. The orange tinting is from the laser glasses. For reference when looking at the beam from a 1+W 445m, it is completely blocked.


2011-08-07_09-56-33pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr



There are more pics on my flickr page in the argon set and there's also a video I made but I need to edit it since half way though I tried to add a bit more fog and the button stuck so all you see for part of it is fog shooting everywhere.
 
Last edited:





Joined
Apr 2, 2009
Messages
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Re: Multiline argon goodness (many pics)

Makes me want to get mine out!!! its past the time for the monthly burn-- Super Pics!!! +2 for them and the kind words-- I should have sent you a lumia motor too.. next time!!
 

Things

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Joined
May 1, 2007
Messages
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0
Re: Multiline argon goodness (many pics)

Nice pics! :)

Amazing how many lines you are getting at idle. I only get 2 at idle, and only if alignment is spot on. Then again, my tube is on it's death bed anyway.

DSCF1185.jpg
 
Joined
Sep 22, 2010
Messages
1,358
Points
48
Re: Multiline argon goodness (many pics)

Since I still had my argon and 473 set up I couldn't help wondering if I could manage to bounce both of them off the mirror and through the other lumia g;ass I got from hak. Even at about 10 feet the divergence of the 473 was already sucking pretty badly but it worked decently enough.


2011-08-11_09-41-29pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr

Add some green...


2011-08-12_09-48-32pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr

I'm not sure why my 532 green is looking more like a HeNe. I'm guessing it's the green from the argon messing with it.


And some blu-ray...


2011-08-11_09-50-57pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr


Put them all together....


2011-08-11_09-47-48pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr

I'll let you figure out how I hand held two lasers and still took the picture ;)

Oh you want red too?


2011-08-12_09-53-16pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr

ML Argon + 473, 532, and 650


2011-08-12_10-01-16pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr


ML Argon + 473 and 532


2011-08-12_10-00-17pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr


ML Argon + 473, 532, and 650


2011-08-12_10-00-47pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr

You can see a bit of yellow from R+G.


Beam shots comparing 445, 473, and 488. The 445 photographs a lot more violet than it is. You can see the real color under the violet. For reference the 445 is 710mw, the 473nm is 6-7mw, and the Argon was running at "triple nickels" (5.55A) in all the pics which would probably be ~40-50mw. I've LPM'd it at 101mw at 10A.


2011-08-12_10-12-28pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr


2011-08-12_10-13-28pm by ltkernelpanic, on Flickr

And finally the video after I edited out the little mishap with the fogger. I should be receiving my projector from Dino in a couple days so I'll use that as an excuse to get my DV cam out and get some good video. My D90 does a good job but the lack of auto focus in video mode kinda sucks.

 




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