Need help

[vaishiklu]

Hi everyone,

I'm a designer and I'm looking at lasers for a very simple reason, that I am not satisfied with ordinary light fittings available in the market.

In my latest design, I am thinking of using lasers to create an installation where I want to see the beam of light travelling instead of light reflected off a surface.

The lasers would be mounted at a non-accessible height on steel columns to form a lattice grid formation and controlled to project beams of light in an algorithm. Think of it like playing the snake game on an old Nokia phone. except with beams of laser that have to be visible in a well-lit showroom.

There are gonna be people around the space but not in direct line of sight of any of the beams. But, I still cannot have the beams dispersing light off their path.

Can someone please help me out here and advice on the wattage that my laser should be, for a white laser beam to travel 2.5 metres, and not burn through anything?




Thanks in advance.

 

[lasersbee]

1) Introduce yourself in the Welcome section and
include your Global Location in your Profile. Members
are more likely to help someone they know a little
about.

2) For Laser Beams to be visible in a well lit room
you would require Lasers with powers in the
Dangerous For Human Eyes range.

3) Your project is looking for an accident to happen... IMO


Jerry

 

[vaishiklu]

Thank you lasersbee.

 

[Nutball]

Fog would definitely help. White beams may be a little hard to come by.

 

[paul1598419]

This is still a bad idea. Lasers are not a light source for people to see with.

 

[Encap]

This is still a bad idea. Lasers are not a light source for people to see with.

Exactly--very bad idea/daydream, very expensive a grid of laser beams visible in a well lit room and would be very dangerous as well for several reasons + not a viable way to light a room

 

[WizardG]

But at the powers required for 'highly visible beams in a well lit room', a grid of beams would dramatically reduce fly and mosquito numbers in the room very quickly.

 

[Encap]

But at the powers required for 'highly visible beams in a well lit room', a grid of beams would dramatically reduce fly and mosquito numbers in the room very quickly.

:crackup:

 

[Skittles]

You don't need high wattage lasers if the room is foggy. White beams would be expensive and complicated but get a low power green laser and some fog = profit.
Also sounds like you would want to keep them running for a long time, you would need constant cooling and power sources for the lasers, which just adds to the complications listed in earlier replies.

 

[paul1598419]

There are 532nm lab lasers that are powered from DC power supplies that run off AC for not very much money. It has been awhile since I bought one, but still have a >230 mW one that can run indefinitely that I paid ~$50.00 for.

 

[WizardG]

There are 532nm lab lasers that are powered from DC power supplies that run off AC for not very much money. It has been awhile since I bought one, but still have a >230 mW one that can run indefinitely that I paid ~$50.00 for.

The picture I use as my avatar was made with an el cheapo fleabay 532 labbie bounced off of a 7 angle UPC scanner. It turns out the PS for the laser was bad and had essentially no output filtering making it an unintentionally pulsed laser creating the 'spokes' seen in the photo. Replacing a couple of cap's in the PS boosted the output from ~50mW to ~200.

 

[paul1598419]

:crackup: Cheap Chinese capacitors.

 

[Cyparagon]

Why is this something that EL wire or LED tape couldn't do?

 

[WizardG]

Why is this something that EL wire or LED tape couldn't do?

The OP said they wanted high visibility in a well lit room. Overdrive EL wire hard enough and it'll do bright, but not for long.