Making a cheap chinese laser legal

[Andrew]

I've been reading this forum for several weeks and this is my first post(im hoping im putting it in the right place)

First a little bit of my background and what i'm hoping to accomplish (you can just skip to the next paragraph if you wish)
Ive been tinkering with, repairing, and building electronics since i was a little kid(around age 6) have had a few jobs in electronics repair(TV mostly) and professionally i have worked as a sound engineer and lighting tech for the last 12 years. I've always been interested in lasers and have been waiting for an excuse to go out and blow some money on them, a burlesque troupe that i work with(doing lighting for them) recently expressed interest in doing a routine involving a wall of laser light (pointed straight down on the floor scanning in a straight or possibly curved line) with the performer doing her routine in the path of the beam.

I have around $700 that i can afford to spend right now and have seen many lasers on ebay from china that fit in this price range,
I'm assuming that a 500mw laser for $400(such as a SHINP AL-460) is probably lacking some important required safety features to be legal and more importantly safe to use in public? id like to get something cheap enough that i have no reservations about tearing it apart and making modifications

So my questions are
1. Am i correct that these lasers are illegal to use in public straight out of the box (even though Ive seen quite a few in clubs I've been working in)?
2. How difficult would it be to either make them compliant at full power, or crank down the power to <5mw?
3. depending on the answer to question 2 is it even worth it, or should i keep my hobby and profession separate and get a really cheap(<$100) single color laser for public use, and spend the real money on building my own?

[Song]

what country are you in Sir?

[Andrew]

I'm in the United States

[flecom]

I've been reading this forum for several weeks and this is my first post(im hoping im putting it in the right place)

First a little bit of my background and what i'm hoping to accomplish (you can just skip to the next paragraph if you wish)
Ive been tinkering with, repairing, and building electronics since i was a little kid(around age 6) have had a few jobs in electronics repair(TV mostly) and professionally i have worked as a sound engineer and lighting tech for the last 12 years. I've always been interested in lasers and have been waiting for an excuse to go out and blow some money on them, a burlesque troupe that i work with(doing lighting for them) recently expressed interest in doing a routine involving a wall of laser light (pointed straight down on the floor scanning in a straight or possibly curved line) with the performer doing her routine in the path of the beam.

I have around $700 that i can afford to spend right now and have seen many lasers on ebay from china that fit in this price range,
I'm assuming that a 500mw laser for $400(such as a SHINP AL-460) is probably lacking some important required safety features to be legal and more importantly safe to use in public? id like to get something cheap enough that i have no reservations about tearing it apart and making modifications

So my questions are
1. Am i correct that these lasers are illegal to use in public straight out of the box (even though Ive seen quite a few in clubs I've been working in)?
2. How difficult would it be to either make them compliant at full power, or crank down the power to <5mw?
3. depending on the answer to question 2 is it even worth it, or should i keep my hobby and profession separate and get a really cheap(<$100) single color laser for public use, and spend the real money on building my own?

1 yes
2 depends
3 depends, but I don't know anything legal you can get for $100

[Bradfo69]

The initial problem you are going to have with that (and there are many others) is the way in which laser light reacts. Shining from ceiling to floor to create a "wall" is going to put the viewer at a terrible angle to see any effect without a whole lot of power. I'm going to estimate about 2.5 - 3 watts of 532 [using platinum's (member here) projector as a benchmark]. http://www.bunkerofdoom.com/texlem20...eos/index.html (Check the video 13th down on the left hand column.)

I'm going to take a stab in the dark here and say that puts you at about $5000-$7000 in todays dollars to get there.

You then have the issue of a dancer being scanned in the path of 3 watts of laser power. In the US, that's gonna be a tough sell, I can assure you!

Now, what you MIGHT be able to do, in your budget range is use something like a Chauvet Scorpion Storm RG, ceiling mounted behind the performer and angled down towards the floor out to the edge of the stage and the dancer could be in a "rain" of thin green and (less visable) red beams. It wouldn't require a variance and would still be a visable effect, just not as filled with as much of a "wow" as a "wall".

[Andrew]

The initial problem you are going to have with that (and there are many others) is the way in which laser light reacts. Shining from ceiling to floor to create a "wall" is going to put the viewer at a terrible angle to see any effect without a whole lot of power. I'm going to estimate about 2.5 - 3 watts of 532 [using platinum's (member here) projector as a benchmark]. http://www.bunkerofdoom.com/texlem20...eos/index.html (Check the video 13th down on the left hand column.)
.

Is there any angle (Maybe 45deg?) that will give a noticable effect anywhere close to the power levels im wanting to be at?

[DanG]

Andrew,

It is nearly impossible to make a SHINP laser legal and if you could the cost of doing it would so vastly exceed your budget that it is not even worth considering. When we do development & compliance on our products - which are spec'ed appropriately from the beginning - it can cost upwards of $100K with $50K as a fairly common number and everyone once in a great while ~$10K if we get very, very lucky.

Secondly, the effect you describe is very dangerous with a high powered laser especially considering that burlesque venues typically do not have very tall ceilings as a proscenium theater might. The closer the performer is to the laser, the lower margin of error. Further, while I don't think you need quite as much power as Brad suggests under a variety of situations you are using laser in one of the least visually helpful ways possible. I shot a quick video to demonstrate the concept:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f_rfZYP0ZZI

Doing a perpendicular shoot does require more power, which increases the hazard. I would find a different way of doing this my friend, perhaps with an LED.

[Bradfo69]

I shot a quick video to demonstrate the concept:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f_rfZYP0ZZI

Thanks Dan! I tried to link him to that very video yesterday and, your site wouldn't allow me to play it for some reason. It's immediately what came to mind to help illustrate my point about viewing angles.

(And, I was thinking about taller ceilings w/respect to power.)

[Andrew]

Andrew,

It is nearly impossible to make a SHINP laser legal and if you could the cost of doing it would so vastly exceed your budget that it is not even worth considering. When we do development & compliance on our products - which are spec'ed appropriately from the beginning - it can cost upwards of $100K with $50K as a fairly common number and everyone once in a great while ~$10K if we get very, very lucky.

Secondly, the effect you describe is very dangerous with a high powered laser especially considering that burlesque venues typically do not have very tall ceilings as a proscenium theater might. The closer the performer is to the laser, the lower margin of error. Further, while I don't think you need quite as much power as Brad suggests under a variety of situations you are using laser in one of the least visually helpful ways possible. I shot a quick video to demonstrate the concept:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f_rfZYP0ZZI

Doing a perpendicular shoot does require more power, which increases the hazard. I would find a different way of doing this my friend, perhaps with an LED.

Thank you very much, thats exactly the kind of info i was looking for. I think ill probably build something using LED's for this current project. I still want to start getting into lasers but probably more for personal experimentation than professional use at this point in time.

[White-Light]

I'm wondering if he might be able to achieve what he wants using a fat beam laser?