I have two first order, high quality, coated quartz, Brewster angle, BRFs in micrometer tunable mounts from picosecond dye lasers.
I found the same BRFs are used in IR as Visible, ie the ones for a certain tunable TI:Saph had the same BRF part numbers as the visible dye.
I found installing BRFs to require a USB spectrometer, nothing more. Its just time consuming to find the correct tuning, but the sweet spot across the BRF disk is broad, like 40-50% of the area of the disk. Most high gain lasers stay lasing somewhat at the peak of the gain curve even when the BRF is a mile off in tuning, then the beam "snaps" to the desired wavelength as the correct BRF rotation and x-y tilt is reached. BRFs have multiple orders, lots of conditions will lase, but there is one place the intracavity loss will be exceptional low and the tuning sharp. I found them not to be a mystery component, just they require persistence.
I would not try to tune one without a CCD spectrometer if I could help it, but its doable.
Talk to me guys.... They are setting here in a drawer.
Custom KTP/BBO is inexpensive by Junktronix/Planters standards if you know where to look...
Steve
Last edited by mixedgas; 04-15-2014 at 12:22.
Qui habet Christos, habet Vitam!
I should have rented the space under my name for advertising.
When I still could have...