UV-ish Vs. IR-ish

[Golden]

which one would burn better and further away a UV laser or IR laser, to avoid specific wattages, the only constant in this question is a price range of $300-400

i've tried digging up some threads, most of them have images uploaded to obscure image hostings that went bust, so if anyone has pics please upload them to imgur so they are safe for at least 10 years

 

[Nutball]

Just remember that you could unknowingly blind yourself or someone with invisible reflections.

I think it would be cool to take advantage of both and combine UV & IR with the obvious known beam combining methods if there wouldn't be significant scattering interference (I don't know much about mixing different colors of lasers).

 

[Golden]

I'm aware of blinding, and i am not interested in mixing them, I am interested in their burning abilities.

 

[NightExplorer96]

I think it depends on materials, some will burn better then others. Realistically though, it's very unlikely many members will be getting UV lasers to experiment with. They're super expensive!

-Alex

 

[ZRaffleticket]

IR. I can't think of any UV laser we can get our hands on for that price range.

If you're not concerned about size, look into co2 gas lasers. If you are, look into 808nm diodes and corrective optics.

Watt per watt, uv would win in a theoretical standpoint (coming to absorption and being able to keep a tighter beam)

 

[Rivem]

which one would burn better and further away a UV laser or IR laser, to avoid specific wattages, the only constant in this question is a price range of $300-400

If you mean 405nm by "UV", 405nm diodes will burn better with less optics at similar power. IR diodes require a lot of corrective optics to burn as well, but they won't beat 405nm at the same power level.

Otherwise, a CO2 tube will burn very well for the price but not be portable.

 

[paul1598419]

Power is power. It seems I still have t make this point. A watt of 405nm is the same power as a watt of 808nm. If you want to burn, it is the energy density of the beam that will concentrate power in the smallest area. A BDR-209 is a single mode diode with 800 mW in a fairly tight beam. It is also inexpensive and requires little in the way of corrective optics. If you want more power than that, it will require corrective optics which will increase the price and difficulty of getting where you want to go.

 

[Golden]

I apologize, I do in fact mean ~405 nm, by UV and I did forget to account for the absorption. I need a minute to think about it.

So.. IR works by making particles vibrate, so... i suppose organic watery objects would be most affected and dry would be more resistant, surface absorption in gray scale would probably matter too. Yeah this isn't easy to think about without testing, if someone has 405 and IR, test it on a green leaf from outside vs white piece of paper

 

[Alaskan]

A 16X 405 nm BDR-209 laser diode is near UV and able to focus into a tiny burning spot further and generally far smaller than IR, but get a FAP800 808nm laser and you have far more burning power.

 

[Golden]

i don't want anything that powerful, i was looking around 2-3 W ranges, not a lot of people play with IR don't understand why

I'd love some pictures, i am also curious in night vision capabilities of ~980nm vs ~808nm how do cameras that have no IR protection detect those, maybe even night vision (like pvs-14)

 

[Alaskan]

2-3 watts at 808nm is cheap, but the beam characteristics lousy except as a DPSS pump, or burner. For illumination should be fine though.

look at my avatar showing 808nm as a violet or purple beam using a camera without an IR filter.

 

[diachi]

not a lot of people play with IR don't understand why

Because it's invisible.

 

[Emialias]

Because it's invisible.

this. the one i got is really scary, its in the range where taking off your goggles just isnt worth it. you cant see it either way but one way can hurt you and one way wont.

 

[Alaskan]

IR in my opinion is only good for either burning, or illumination if spread out into a wide beam. But why use a laser for that? For illumination you don't need a laser diode, you can buy cheap LED IR sources. I suppose for long distances a laser IR source is the choice, due to being able to collimate a fairly tight beam, but otherwise, I don't think a laser diode is much needed for that.

 

[lasersbee]

First... It would have been nice if you
had introduced yourself to the Forum
community in the Welcome section and
told us about your experience with High
Powered Lasers.

Second, what actually do you intend to
do with such a High Powered Laser whether
it be in the near UV spectrum or the near
IR spectrum... And why an almost invisible
IR wavelength..:thinking:

Jerry

 

[NightExplorer96]

Because it's invisible.

this. the one i got is really scary, its in the range where taking off your goggles just isnt worth it. you cant see it either way but one way can hurt you and one way wont.

^That's the answer right there, and also probably because IR is invisible and most laser users not in it for the hobby just want to see a beam & burn things. IR will for the most part take care of the burning, but not so much on the beam part of it.

I was actually considering buying a 10mW 780nm pointer but decided agaisnt it simply due to it's visiblity. I'm into this hobby for wavelength's, not so much burning. While 780nm is visible, it's really the same thing as a 650 pointer but so dim you'd probably need a microscope to see the dot

-Alex