My First Blue Ray

[GoRdOn_B]

So after about a week of waiting my 803-t sled finally arrived. i have successfully extracted the diode from the sled and have placed it into the housing. now  i just have to attach the driver and place it into the host. i have 3 hosts that im choosing between, i really like them all. one of them is the compact 9 led and the other is a dorcy mini single AAA. i saw it in the "post your blue ray host". the last is a garrity led aluminum.  i think all are great hosts but still cant deside. the one i like most is the tiny dorcy but it looks tricky. i tried to show pix but my post count isnt high enough yet  :

 

[Spyderz20x6]

Try doing the Garrity LED aluminum. Looks like it has a lot of room

 

[GoRdOn_B]

i dont usualy have much time to do my own thing but i still manage sometimes. so it was last weekend my X actually wanted to take my son for once, </rant> and i had all of my things ready to go. i had ordered a new lavadrive 2 (which i was very impressed with btw) for the host i desided on using. i wanted to use the garrity aluminum becuase it had a longer neck, but it had 4 full twists and i was worried about pulling the wires from the LD so i thought i shouldnt use that one. the one i chose was the compact 9 led host that jayrob posted the tutorial for (/forums/YaBB.pl?num=1213338268). i found them at walmart for only 5 dollars. i actually made myself a custom heatsink from an old prosessor heatsink i pulled off an old pc by cutting off the fins with a jigsaw and cutting a circle out with a bit i use for cutting out deadlocks at work. then i just drill pressed out the center. i was pretty impressed with myself on that one because i thought it came out really good. so i hooked everything together, (before i put it in the host) and turned it on. it worked great. i didnt leave it on for more than 5 seconds or so because it was very unfocused so i turned it off and placed it in the housing. everything fit really well. after it was fully assembled i went to turn it on.... and nothing. so i waited a second... still nothing. so i turned it off, then back on.. still nothing. so i took it out of the housing to look at it. all of the wire connections have heatshrink tubing on them and i didnt see any soulder touching or loose. everything looked fine. i discussed this with a friend of mine for a while and he thinks i may have shocked it becuase i wasnt grounded out. i dont think it was that because i did it in the kitchen where the floor is tiled and my table is wood. sadly enough thats all we can come up with so im still not sure what went wrong.

i havent given up though, but so far im 0/1 on the blue ray

 

[daguin]

Was the diode completely dark or did it glow violet dimly? Did you take it back out of the host and try powering it up again? Did you take the diode off and test the driver with a dummy load? Completely dark diodes don't always mean a dead diode

Now a newly created LED . . .That's a different matter

Peace,
dave

 

[GoRdOn_B]

ok so i ordered a new 803t. tried again. after carefully assembeling... it worked! i was pretty amazed. i saw the beam right off. it was a very nice purple. so i had together monday night. it is pretty well heatsinked and i have only left it on for 30 seconds at a time... max. last night i shined it into my time tunnel and it looked pulsed or something... no solid line but dash dash dash. so i put in new batteries.. problem fixed. nice solid beam. i shined it into the sky at night. i was really amazed with the distance. it looked like it went as far as my green one. so today i come home from work and it was dead... i shined it on a peice of white paper and it wasnt, dead but a new l.e.d. so i thought maybe i just killed the batteries pretty fast.. but nope. after about 10 seconds of purple l.e.d. its dead. im still pretty bummed. im not really sure what it was. i used a lavadrive set at 175.. maybe it was too much. maybe it was just a bad diode. either way. im bummed out. 2 days wasnt enough time to get my fulfillment

 

[daguin]

ok so i ordered a new 803t. tried again. after carefully assembeling...  it worked! i was pretty amazed. i saw the beam right off. it was a very nice purple. so i had together monday night. it is pretty well heatsinked and i have only left it on for 30 seconds at a time... max. last night i shined it into my time tunnel and it looked pulsed or something... no solid line but dash dash dash. so i put in new batteries.. problem fixed. nice solid beam. i shined it into the sky at night. i was really amazed with the distance. it looked like it went as far as my green one. so today i come home from work and it was dead... i shined it on a peice of white paper and it wasnt, dead but a new l.e.d. so i thought maybe i just killed the batteries pretty fast.. but nope. after about 10 seconds of purple l.e.d. its dead. im still pretty bummed. im not really sure what it was. i used a lavadrive set at 175.. maybe it was too much. maybe it was just a bad diode. either way. im bummed out. 2 days wasnt enough time to get my fulfillment  

Yeah.  I know.  It sucks, man.  Some of these diodes cannot take 175mA.  Sometimes the diode is weakened by how it was handled or how much heat it got.  Sometimes enthusiasts just get carried away and burn them longer than they think that they did.  Sometimes I think that they they die on purpose, just to see that look on our face.

If you're going to run these diodes at high currents (above 150mA) then you have to be ready for them to occasionally just die for no apparent reason.  It is one of the reasons why I put my high powered builds through a week of "hell."  I want to make sure that they are going to survive the burn-in experience.  One good thing is that every time you re-build it, you get better.  Plus, if you suspect that you are driving them too hard (or are just tired of re-building them), you can adjust the driver down when you re-build it.  Although, once you've seen the beam at 175mA, it is harder to accept the beam at 150mA

I feel your pain

Peace,
dave

 

[Spyderz20x6]

ok so i ordered a new 803t. tried again. after carefully assembeling...  it worked! i was pretty amazed. i saw the beam right off. it was a very nice purple. so i had together monday night. it is pretty well heatsinked and i have only left it on for 30 seconds at a time... max. last night i shined it into my time tunnel and it looked pulsed or something... no solid line but dash dash dash. so i put in new batteries.. problem fixed. nice solid beam. i shined it into the sky at night. i was really amazed with the distance. it looked like it went as far as my green one. so today i come home from work and it was dead... i shined it on a peice of white paper and it wasnt, dead but a new l.e.d. so i thought maybe i just killed the batteries pretty fast.. but nope. after about 10 seconds of purple l.e.d. its dead. im still pretty bummed. im not really sure what it was. i used a lavadrive set at 175.. maybe it was too much. maybe it was just a bad diode. either way. im bummed out. 2 days wasnt enough time to get my fulfillment  

175mA is way too much... try 150mA, or 130mA...

 

[GoRdOn_B]

i managed to take 2 pictures yesterday on my phone. so here is one.
the smaller beam on the left is the actual beam.. the one on the right is just the reflection, but looks much better.
anyone notice how some mirrors seem to intensify the beam?

about 15 mins ago i pulled the diode out and tried to hook up my first diode and it freekin worked. so im going to swap it. i saw the diagram for a dummy load and here is what i got. will this work ?

 

[positron]

cool pics

That breadboard you have there looks like a power bus that is usually used along with a breadboard but you just use it for the power rails (your positive and negative power supply connections).

If you use a multimeter set on continuity or ohms setting, connect one lead to the very far left leg of your diodes and the other lead to the far right side leg of your diodes and if that reads 0 ohms or very close to 0 ohms then its not going to work properly. You may as well just solder the diodes together anyway as it takes up less space that way too.