polarization problem HELP!

[Tesa]

hey laser freaks

Can anyone help me how I get my non polarized whitelite laser polarized?


thanks in advance

Christian Tesa

[gottaluvlasers]

depends on a few things-

1) is it solid state white ight?

2) what are your wavelengths?

3) are any of the wavelengths using multi-diode randomly polarized lasers? (most likely this *is* the case)

4) Do you know the polarization of said lasers above?

I think (although i may be wrong) that you would have to polarize each lasers output to a known and similar polarization and then in turn polarize the main white output via a wave plate. If each individulas laser output is randomly polarized or polarized differently and you only use 1 wave plate on the main output you will only be polarizing 1 beam depending on the orientation of the wave plate optic. The losses with wave plates is pretty significant also.

Just out of curiosity, why do you want to polarize this output?

-Marc

[-bart-]

I can think of 3 reasons to make white light polarized:

a) It's a mixedgas ArKr and you want to run it through a pcaom, which are pretty polarization sensitive.
Then you've got a problem: adding brewsters to a gaslasers is not exactly feasible.

b) you've got two solid state white lights projectors and want to project 3d vector art.
The only way to obtain polarized output is to mix and match R,G and B laser components.
Keep in mind that a galvo pair is a natural polarization rotator.

c) You running some kind of of scientific setup, in that case we need a lot more info.

Either way, there is no magical component that transfers random polarized or 50:50 into 1:100 with acceptable losses.

You can always split a beam with a pbs and knife-edge both parts together, but this will double your beam diameter. And it won't turn a random polarized beam into something you get from a HeNe.

[catalanjo]

You can always split a beam with a pbs and knife-edge both parts together, but this will double your beam diameter. And it won't turn a random polarized beam into something you get from a HeNe.

Just to clarify bart's comment!

Many HeNe s have been churned out with random polarization for at least twenty five years now!
Only the expensive "good" ones with Iodine cells have shit hot polarization and coherence lengths !

Cheers

[Tesa]

as Bart says, I have a mixedgaslaser I will run through a pcaom. However, I have found another possible solution. I have an argon tube that is polarized, but there I need a strong red source. my argon tubes is 10w so it can go through my pcaom without problems. can i connect the beam from the argon tube and the diode after the pcaom? does anyone have experience with this, and how powerful a diode would you recommend?

and not least where is the best place to buy such a diode?

thanks in advance
Tesa

[-bart-]

Adding a red beam after the pcaom is technically no problem.
Problem with red multi diode setups is the beam quality.
Even the best are nowhere near an argon, you'll end up with a cyan spike in a red blob.
So you'll have to artificially worsen the divergence of the argon.

Best solution would be adding a 1 or 2W taipan opsl, if you'll have to ask how much €, you'll probably can't afford it.

[catalanjo]

Adding a red beam after the pcaom is technically no problem.
So you'll have to artificially worsen the divergence of the argon.

Best way to do this, is multi-multi mode optics on the Argon .... you get a load more power as a side effect. Can't remember off hand what radius of curvature works best but Steve (mixedgas) can probably tell you with out having to think about it too much.

Which Argon do you have

Cheers