|
|
New Articles:
Southern California Glider Landout Database Soaring 5-Inch Sky Robot FDM in Vacuum Gin Books Hacktastic e-bike Farnsworth Fusor Land Anchor Turchickentato Bowmaking Custom Discovery Roof Rack August, 2012 - Sierra Backpacking July 22nd, 2012 - Hiking in Santa Barbara July 15th, 2012 - Valley of Fire May 5th, 2012 - Afton Canyon April 28th, 2012 - Devils Playground Alpine Tripod Convict Creek Trail January 2012 - Mustangs January 3rd, 2012 - Heart Lake August 7th, 2011 - Kelso Dunes August 5th, 2011 - Lundy Canyon Hike August 2011, Mammoth Archery Birds in the garden June 4th, 2011 - San Gorgonio May 29th, 2011 - Sequoia National Forest April 23rd, 2011 - Living Desert April 2nd, 2011 - Death Valley March 8th, 2011 - Mountain Palm Springs February 13th, 2011 - Iron Smelt Blacksmithing November 13th, 2010 - Mojave October, 2010 - Mammoth Android September, 2010 - Mammoth September, 2010 - Duck Lake Trail Backpacking Red Iron bloom forging August 28th, 2010 - Mt. San Jacinto OSM Import: US Designated Wilderness July 25th, 2010 - Mojave Mustangs July 17th, 2010 - Mojave Exploration Bloomery furnace iron smelting Open Street Map: Mojave Project June 13th, 2010 - Mojave June 6th, 2010 - El Cajon Trails Wolf Mountain Sanctuary Carrizo Gorge March 28th, 2010 - Salton Sea March 21st, 2010 - South Main Divide March 13th, 2010 - Anza Borrego Wildflowers March 7th, 2010 - CSULB Japanese Garden February 2010 - Mammoth GeoRSS AISlib OpenStreetMap Dakota and Asha Celebrate Christmas, 2009 November 21st, 2009 - Mojave Road November 14th, 2009 - Anza Borrego Exploring The East Mojave: The Afton Canyon Area Broken flex plate Remote Image Serving Astro/night photography in Inyo National Forest Wild Mustang Sightings RSS September 26th, 2009 - Night Photography In Frazier Park Whiskey Brandy August 15th, 2009 - Catalina dive trip Astrophotography Sensornet January 24th, 2009 - Mojave Exploration July 2008 Mammoth Vacation AIS President Barack Obama! Rachel Maddow Big Geek Barack Obama April 12th, 2008 - Wildflowers and Landmarks My Grandfather's Alfa Romeo Spider March 8th, 2008 - Carrizo Plain Bridge To Nowhere High Availability October 20th, 2007 - Big Bear Camping October 22nd, 2007 - Fire Scottish Highlands, Aug 7th, 2006 Scottish Highlands, Aug 6th, 2006 August 5th, 2007 - Duck Lake Trail May 26th, 2007 - Kelso Dunes Culloden Battlefield, Aug 5th, 2006 May 20th, 2006 - Irwindale Renaissance Faire Edinburgh, Aug 4th, 2006 The Clifs of Moher, Aug 3rd, 2006 The Burren, Aug 2nd, 2006 Bunratty Castle, Aug 1st, 2006 May 5th, 2007 - Mojave Truck Audio/Data Network 2007 - Master Bath Remodel Centrum: Exit The Ring of Kerry, Jul 31st, 2006 Nikon D200 Victory in 2006! Blarney and Killarney, Jul 30th, 2006 Dublin and Cork, Jul 29th, 2006 Dublin, Jul 27th & 28th, 2006 Married! What Can I Do? April 30th, 2006 - Anza Borrego New desktop: Intel 805 D Macro Photography Jan 7th and 14th, 2006 - Hiking Whiting Ranch Hiking Engaged! Digital Photography with Linux September 5th, 2005 - Living Desert August 19th, 2005 - Mammoth Hiking and Photography July 30th, 2005 - Tucker Wildlife Sanctuary Nikon D70 Death, Fright and Photography Mmmmmm Eggs MythTV Inova T4 May 14th, 2005 - Red Rock April 2nd, 2005 - Death Valley Count Every Vote Act of 2005 Image Archiving Linear Logic ScanGuage Gentoo Linux November 6, 2004 - Mojave Super Tuesday, 2004 John Kerry Kayaking Irish Stew ImageServer Ireland, 2004 Canon A80 Camera Jul 25, 2004 - Death Valley Chronic Hiccups May 4th, 2004 Landscaping - My Front Slope Stump Pullin' Yeeee Haw! Feb 22nd, 2004 Feb 16th, 2004 PostgreSQL Logfile Analysis Spam Mountains? Desert? Jan 30th, 2004 Jan 28th, 2004 Encryption Ceiling Cargo Basket Front Bumper Version 2 Asha Exide Orbitals Land Rover Valve Jobs Spirits The Matrix: Revolutions Halloween 2003 Greg Davis CDL Linkage Ouzo Democracy Mom's Turkey Gravy Grandma's Guacamole Top Nodes Julian Pie Company DeCSS The KB1DIG 2-meter Halo Antenna Incomming searches Gardening is hard! Aug 13th, 2003 SQL and Perl Cancun 2003 Jul 9th, 2003 Aprs intelegence Jun 17th, 2003 Some People's Comments Dakota is a silly dog The Matrix: Reloaded Chris' Stage Bottle Harness April 23rd, 2003 Cracked Radiator! Black Wednesday DVD Burning Under Linux My Satellite Phone Wind! My Near-Death Experience Laser Cannon Revival Front Bumper, Version 2 SpamAssassin The Critters Dakota Milton KPC 3 Plus and HTX-252 My House Moving, moving moving... Mobile 1 Portola Hills New new house Suse Linux Database images In Truck Dr. Pepper My Favorite Toilet Kelso Dunes Desert Trips Ifulmuh Late Thoughts: Dr. Pepper Cooler 265/75-R16 Tires on a DII Linux George W. Bush Rants Driving Reservations Horses Sep 14 2002 Obsession August 17th Yukon Dives Less notifications My Custom Front Bumper Bracketless, Renamable Links Discreet Winch Welding Jul 28 2002 Day Trip My Firewall Jedi Group, my T1 and money A Bumperless Discovery! My Custom Rear Bumper Vanessa's 24th Birthday Jun 30th Dive to Long Beach Canyon PHP/PostgreSQL String Quoting Tonsillectomy, Uvulaectomy and Turbinite Reduction Searching functionality 240 Watt CO2 Laser Cannon My Workspace Dr. Pepper The Tulsa Rib Company The quality of hard disks these days Email notification of articles Email notification of comments erikburrows.com source code User Bios User Preferences Login feature Renisance Faire Jun 9, 2002 Computers hate me, and it is mutual. Star Wars Sucks! Horses, Jun 1, 2002 Land Rover Mileage Insomnia, Robin goes evil. 100 Watt Diode Laser Test Firing 1 Amateur Radio The Matrix 2001: A Space Odyssey TDI Deco Class Horses, Apr 30, 2002 APRS Movies Blackbird My Truck Batteries My Truck Vasquez Rocks The Zope Bible PSK31 Mojave Apr-12-2002 100 Watt Diode Laser The New www.erikburrows.com Hunter the Kitty Horses Geeks Yukon May-13-2001 Computers Matts Desert Pics Mojave Feb-10-2001 Mojave Apr-01-2001 Programming Languages Ironage Jul-4-2001 Mojave Jan-27-2001 Ironage Feb-03-2001 Mojave Jun-09-2001 SCUBA Jedi Group
|
|
|
|
100 Watt Diode Laser Test Firing 1 -   2002/05/09 | Viewed 125 times this month, last update: 2003/12/13
|
| Today Chris and I conducted our first test firing
of our 100 Watt Diode Laser. It was a complete sucess! Since the laser was meant to
feed directly into a fibre optic cable for delivery, without the fibre, the beam is very
diverse. It spreads out from the head at about a 20 degree angle. It's hot enough however
that a piece of paper held an inch away from the head will burn.
We rigged together a focusing system using a few spare lenses, and were able to get wood
blocks to burn and char quite a bit.
Here are all the pictures.
On the very first try, we got a beam out of the first head. As you can see,
the laser is actually several lasers, in three rows, we figure about 100.
Each, of modest power, but when focused together, give 100 watts.
|
The second head seems to be old, or otherwise damaged. It had a much lower
output.
|
The wounded wood block.
|
The focusing setup. We need some cleaner optics, and a better mounting system,
but for what it was, it worked fairly well!
|
Lasers are cool.
|
|
Comments:
Click Here to view the first 7 comments to this article!
Photon Bender (2003-12-11): I was surprised when Laser Jock showed me this site. I am the person who was responsible for building this system. I think that there were originally 10 heads made and maybe 4 or 5 diode driver / cooler systems. The systems were intended for Photo Dynamic Therapy experiments being done at UCI. The label on the head is misleading; it is not a 100-Watt laser, for safety reasons the label rating exceeds the actual output. The highest output any of these heads achieved was about 20 Watts although that was out of a fiber (I would have to look up the coupling efficiency, probably around 50%) therefore the max output was probably 40 Watts. From what I recall the diodes output decayed after a short time (a year or so) and there were some diode failures. Judging by your photo it looks like there are only 3 out of 5 diodes operational, I do recall having to replace some diodes with spacers when the diode supply ran out.
Erik (2003-12-11): Wow! How interesting it is to meet the person who built this thing!
You say there were only 5 diodes in each head? Why does the beam output look like a hundred or so small rectangles? We assumed each of those were one diode.
John (2003-12-11): Holy sh*t this is crazier!!! Watch your eyes dudes...
Photon Bender (2003-12-13): There are 5 diode bars in each head. Each bar is segmented into hundreds of emitters, the emitters are isolated from each other. So the gaps you are seeing is the isolation zones. You don't have to tell me but out of curiosity how much did you pay for the system? If you want to you can buy the fiber that attaches to the head, the fiber pigtails come pre assembled. I can look up which fiber was used but I believe it was a 600 micron fiber (it takes a large diameter fiber).
Erik (2003-12-13): I see. Interesting. If I remember correctly, we paid $300 for the power supply/cooling unit, and the two heads. We bought it just for fun, and it is. Thanks for building it for us!
Photon Bender (2003-12-13): $300, you did pretty damn good. The chiller alone is worth more than that. Congratulations and have fun.
Andy (2008-01-23): Wow,that laser looks awesome... me and my friend are only just now working on our first laser... just a 5 watt laser diode on a mac light hahaha. but thanks for the inspiration to one day burn my cornea! nice work
GraveOne (2008-04-29): HELL YEAH!!! Im still working on a pocket size 500mW laser... anyone now of a good diode I could use???...
g (2009-09-14): now yo just have to pack it with a drill battery and mcu lol
startreck phaser on-the-way!
MAR (2011-02-07): Hi. A friend and I looking to build a laser cutter able to cut plastic, and I was wondering if there was any advice, manufacturers, or websites that you could recommend. You obviously know what you are doing and any tips you can give us would be much appreciated!
Erik (2011-02-13): MAR, I don't know where to send you, except maybe projects related to the makerbot.
jake (2011-10-21): im working on a science project... we need to know at what level wattage can a laser go through human skin?
Erik (2011-10-24): Hi Jake, I don't know exactly what you're trying to do, but anything above 1 milliwatt can cause immediate blindness. The above 30 watt red frequency laser could do serious burning damage to human skin, about as much as a large Fresnel lens and sunlight.
jake (2011-10-24): nothing illegal haha. Were doing this for a science fair project and testing what power the military would need to make an effective laser weapon. Basically, how much power does a laser need to be to go through a person in a half a second
Erik (2011-10-24): Jake, practicality of such a weapon aside, you'd need thousands of watts, maybe millions to accomplish such a burn. Laser weapons are much more suited for sensitive and easily de-stabilized targets, like ICBMs, which is what the military is currently developing laser weapons for.
jake (2011-10-24): right now we are in the process of making a 1 watt laser we plan to test it on ballistic gell and time it. using this we could find a rough estimate on how many watts. How thick should the ballistic gel be to repersent a human body
braiden (2011-10-24): how much heat does it take to light a match????
Photon Bender (2011-10-24): hey Erik. i was just looking at your co2 powered cannon. how much did it cost to make?
Erik (2011-10-24): Jake, a 1-watt laser will take a loooong time to melt its way though ballistic jell. For depth, I'd measure your own torso.
Braiden, sorry, no idea.
Photon Bender, the CO2 laser was bought from a salvage yard. New, it would cost several thousand dollars.
jake (2011-10-25): thanks... ill get back to you on our results at the end of the expierement
See also: 100 Watt Diode Laser
permalink
|
|