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Suggestions for components????

Tyagi

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Jul 24, 2018
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I'm planning to but the PL520B and PL450B laser diodes, but since this is my first time with building lasers, I need help in deciding which drivers, collimating optics and heat sinks would be suitable along with these diodes. I was thinking of LDD200P driver from Wavelength electronics. Any suggestions??
 





Joined
Sep 20, 2013
Messages
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The PL520B has a high Vf, so you would do better with a boost driver for it. The PL450B is much lower and any good buck driver should work well for it. On lenses it matters what is more important to you; power or beam divergence. I personally like power out of the 450nm diodes, so I use a glass aspheric short focal length lens like the G2. You might be more concerned with beam diameter and a 2 element or 3 element lens will work best for that, but expect up to 25% loss in power over the G2. If you get a box, or rectangular artifact with your 520nm diode, try DTR's 2 element 520 AR coated lens. It seems to work well at eliminating that.
 

Tyagi

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Jul 24, 2018
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thanks Paul, you said any driver would be fine with the 450nm diode, would that still be the case with Thor Labs' L450P1600MM (1600mW 450nm diode) as well? and where can I find a heat sink for this?
 
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If you provide a link to the driver you want to use, I will have a look at it for you. I don't have the time right now to search for a specific driver I am not already familiar with.
 
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I would not buy that driver as it is almost $100 and only outputs up to 200 mA. Which Osram 450nm diode are you looking at? I thought it might be the PLTB450B, in which case I would use a 1.8 amp X-Drive from DTR's website. If it is the single mode PLT5 450B, you still want to drive it at 300 mA as it puts out about 1W/A. I don't have a driver in mind for that one, but you can do better than a $100 driver that only puts out 0.2 amps.
 
Joined
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Messages
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Points
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Oh, you bought that from Thor Labs? It is the single mode laser diode and could be had from DTR for $22. That is a low power diode, so I think the maximum power output safely is ~300 mW. Of course to get there, you need to supply it with 300 mA of current. I have a couple of drivers in my stock from a few years ago that were the adjustable X-Drives from laseerer. Unfortunately, they are no longer available, but it is what I would use to drive this. I don't have another driver that I know of to drive this laser diode, but you could certainly use that $100 driver you linked earlier as it should give you ~200 mW at 200 mA. Good luck to you.
 

Tyagi

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Joined
Jul 24, 2018
Messages
11
Points
3
oh okaay, like I said this is my first time with LASERs of any kind, so I really don't know anything... bound to do a lot of mistakes. Thank you!
 




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