Unusual thing happening with my Aries-150

[ultimatekaiser]

This has been an unusual sporadic occurrence with my Aries 150. Anybody have any ideas on what it is? It sometimes ''grows'' a triangular speckled blob off the the side and it doesn't seem to do it for any rhyme or reason. The laser is hardly used since i bought it in March, and it doesn't seem related to the batteries. (as it happens with both old and new batteries) It doesn't always do it when i use it either...usually its a little ways into using it, but there are instances when it happens right after i turn it on...(after a few seconds)

Originally it didn't bother me, but lately I've been leaving it on for lightly longer time frames, and it seems to be somewhat heat related and its kinda getting annoying, but if so, then why does it sometimes happen right away? I've been using the Hercules instead, but it's a little big and powerful for what I'm doing and not my first choice.

Thoughts? anyone ever seen this before?

Serial is: 11011984 if Event_Horizon or Justin see this

Normal diffuse on the wall:

Effect in question:

 

[Speedy78]

Is the laser mode-hoping when this occurs? That's the only thing I can think of. Laser jumps to another mode after it heats up and then produces a odd reflection from some part of the beam interfering with the laser aperture.

 

[ultimatekaiser]

That's kinda what i was wondering myself. It does tend to do that more when I use the beam expander, and it does like to hop around with it on, as the laser head can't breathe. Let me give it a shake down for a minute and get it to do it again. I'll observe it and see what it does exactly.

Edit: Ok, it does appear to be sloppily changing modes, its not really a distinguishable shape, but it appears to be a sort of sloppy TEM30 with the speckling coming off one end of it.

 

[Speedy78]

Shoot it at a wall the furthest away you can (so the beam diverges enough to get a decent dot) and view it under safety glasses.

 

[ultimatekaiser]

Shoot it at a wall the furthest away you can (so the beam diverges enough to get a decent dot) and view it under safety glasses.

That's exactly what I did. it's a TEM03, but the center lines are somewhat crooked, and one of the ends is distorted, and zigzags outward away from the core of the beam and becomes the speckling mess next to it.

 

[Speedy78]

Ahh, well we know what this issue is now. Only thing you could do is a more strict duty cycle or store the laser is a cooler place like in a drawer, not under a desk lamp.

 

[ultimatekaiser]

Ahh, well we know what this issue is now. Only thing you could do is a more strict duty cycle or store the laser is a cooler place like in a drawer, not under a desk lamp.

its 100% duty cycle, and it isnt under a desklamp that's hot or anything, i just happened to use my desk as the place of choice to photo it. I doubt it should do this.

took a photo for record purposes.

The photo doesn't show it too well, but it it is a single dot then a bunch of zig-zags next to it. its not a clear mode of any kind, all the lines are connected. I just cycled the laser on and off for less than a second and it is now a stable TEM00 again and hasnt changed back.

 

[Speedy78]

Very weird. At least we know why its doing it now.

 

[ultimatekaiser]

Indeed. Its quite a strange phenomenon. Its almost always (and supposed to be) TEM00. but it just shifted back. Been quite a while now... and i watched it this time, went to TEM20 then this funny TEM30 wannabe. cycled it again, and its now stable again at TEM00....how odd. The herc mode shifts after a long while. but it stays stable near TEM00 for a while, then after a long time, shifts to TEM01 and stays there until it cools sufficiently-easy and predictable.

Edit: I also notice that it seems to do it less on Duracell C cell batteries. It does it much more often with Energizer C cells. Perhaps it is battery related after all? Unstable power input/regulation maybe from the cells?

 

[ultimatekaiser]

Update: (sorry for the double post)

I ran the batteries till they drained, then used up a pair of energizers. results are as follows:

It turns out that the blurb seems to come from battery instability. I found that it came from the Duracell batteries a lot less than the Energizer batteries, and it does do it far more frequently once the batteries are drained, after about an hour an a half to two-ish hours on the Duracell C cells it started doing it about a second after i turned it on repeatedly. I turned off the laser and took out the cells and let them sit for a minute to let them rest before putting them back inside and restarting the laser. The laser came back on very weak, and 'blurbed' again after about a second after starting causing it to dim further, almost to pointer strength fading fast soon after. The energizers went unstable more frequently than the duracells as well, but all in all had the same results.

I thought I'd post this in case anybody else has a similar problem in the future. Guess I also know that I wont be using energizers in this thing anymore either! :na: