What brought you to LPF

[VirtueViolater]

Hi, I'm pretty new on the forum but already feel a part of the site thanks to friendly, informative and helpful members here. This is an awesome collection of people and I often wonder what steered individual members here.

In my case, it was 303/301 eBay lasers. There, I said it! (Lol) I am still impressed with the combination of value and power of these things. I actually use my weakest 532's often, setting and adjusting lenses I've been accumulating from fleamarket telescopes, DTR's projector units, dvdrw drives etc. (I know this is dangerous, 50mw 520nm single mode build in the works)
I have these lasers to thank for putting a drive in me to seek information about lasers, eventually leading me to this fountain of laser knowledge.
Thanks ahead of time for reading, or posting if you have time
-Danny

 

[Razako]

I first got into lasers when I saw one of those 'popular science' magazine adds for laserglow way back when. I started out by getting a Lyra-5 and a Aries-35 from them. Then I saw an awesome youtube video showing off an optotronics RPL popping balloons, lighting things and doing other cool stuff. I think I googled optotronics RPL and found a link to this forum where a member was reviewing one. I got a RPL-300 as my first truly high powered laser and from there I was hooked. I still have that laser today, although the output has dropped over the years.

 

[Dr.Laser]

I was looking for a quality replacement for my dead green pointer. I found novalasers and by researching them it simply led me to here.

 

[OVNI]

My avatar. Didn't play with red so went looking for another color and found a DPSS green @ 50mW. Didn't take long to find LPF, get several custom built lasers and hosts, and learn how to make/fix them myself. This is my first forum too.

 

[VirtueViolater]

My avatar. Didn't play with red so went looking for another color and found a DPSS green @ 50mW. Didn't take long to find LPF, get several custom built lasers and hosts, and learn how to make/fix them myself. This is my first forum too.

So, did the cat like green?
Danny

 

[ElectricPlasma]

I too was hooked by the 303 (I feel a lot of us were, but who knows) from eBay, thought it was pretty cool. I remember turning it on for the first time and not expecting much, as before I had only used presentation pointers. The output was insanely bright (from what it looked like at the time) I kinda flipped and threw the thing lol the more I kept screwing around with it the more I enjoyed it. Once it broke I took it apart and found that even more interesting. I later bought a very cool looking 445nm off eBay (one of the cheap chinese ones) and that was able to burn fairly easily. Wanting to know how these things work, I was surfing the internet one night and came across this site. I was a lurker for quite a while, but then made an actual account and a while back ago built my first laser, and I've got a custom designed one in the works right now. Pretty cool site if I do say so myself

 

[OVNI]

So, did the cat like green?
Danny

Yes. Like catnip. But they're all afraid of the blues (we have 5 cats) and it's worse with lower wavelengths, i.e. really really afraid of 405nm, normal afraid of 450nm. I looked for a color response curve for cats but didn't find anything (thought maybe the lower blue wavelengths were really bright to them).

 

[ElectricPlasma]

Yes. Like catnip. But they're all afraid of the blues (we have 5 cats) and it's worse with lower wavelengths, i.e. really really afraid of 405nm, normal afraid of 450nm. I looked for a color response curve for cats but didn't find anything (thought maybe the lower blue wavelengths were really bright to them).

Weird, but an interesting pattern. I know cats do have some sort of night-color vision thing going on, maybe they have a stronger ability to detect lower wavelengths?

Regardless, I love cats

 

[VirtueViolater]

I have 3, they love all colors

 

[Isaac Clarke]

Styropyro's youtube chanel led me here.

 

[Antharak]

Saw a youtube video of one of rick trent's 445nm 3 watts and bought one immediately. Then I saw a referral to LPF in the comments and that's how I found LPF. IMO the best forum on the web. :beer:

 

[EllyEnthusiastic]

A friend gave me one of those cheapo green pens with a star cap. It broke, so I went to look for a replacement. Looked around online to find a cheap replacement, and I found this forums.

Bought a 303, loved it, went looking for something more powerful. And now I'm waiting for my 1W 445 from Sanwu!

 

[Dutch67]

A combination of Styropryo's Youtube channel, and my grandfather who nurtured my interests in lasers and technology in general.

 

[VirtueViolater]

A friend gave me one of those cheapo green pens with a star cap. It broke, so I went to look for a replacement. Looked around online to find a cheap replacement, and I found this forums.

Bought a 303, loved it, went looking for something more powerful. And now I'm waiting for my 1W 445 from Sanwu!

Any day now Elly

 

[abciswell]

I was giving a big presentation in front of my city's planning commission and wanted to stand out by using a green laser pointer instead of a red one...ended up spending 3 hours on the computer that night watching cool higher powered laser videos. One of the youtube videos mentioned how helpful LPF was and so I came over here and lurked for about 5 months. During that 5 months I bought 3 lasers (and safety goggles, don't worry) and used all the advice from the nice people here without even making an account! I finally made an account when I saw the pictures that user grainde posted of his glow in the dark Kryton groove builds, and I actually made the account just to pm him about buying one

Fast forward 3 months and I'm waiting for my first blue and lasers from Sanwu.

 

[Vision]

Astronomy family members who have massive amounts of lasers. Ever since I was little they gave me quite a good collection each year. I checked out this forum in the early 2009-10 but didn't register or anything, just passed by.
They mentioned about a new 7W diode they got and it led me back here to inquire more. Styropyro's videos were somehow involved since it was the first video I saw about the NUBM44 but I used to watch him way before having any deep interest in lasers.