Greetings everyone,
I just joined the forum a few days ago and thought maybe it would be a good idea to introduce myself.
My name is Brad. I live in southwestern Pennsylvania. I'm 30 years old and have loved lasers since the first time I ever saw one (mid eighties). A traveling company brought their rig to my hometown and put on a laser show at a local high school... I was 'bitten by the bug' and have been addicted ever since.
Over the years, I've amassed what I consider a fair amount of equipment for someone who doesn't make money off their hobby. My inventory includes:
o Lexel 95 and power supply... Dead... Tube needs reworked but cannot afford it. I'd love to retube it, but unless a good deal comes along at the right time, I probably won't be able to afford it.
o Two Lexel 75's and 3 phase power supply. These are actually the first ion lasers that I got up and running. Both are in working condition. It was pretty exciting to take a heap of surplus equipment, realign the mirrors, rebuild the PSU's, etc, and actually get 'first light' from them both!
o ALC 60X... I've never powered it up. Bought it used with single line optics in it, for a good price. Checked it with my oudin coil to make sure the tube was intact, fried the igniter board with the oudin, and then packed it away. I was fully planning on building a supply for it, but that was 10 years ago. I'd still like to. I need to replace the ignitor first, though.
o ALC 909... With a switching PSU for it, and a filament transformer. I believe I have everything necessary to put into service, but alas it's been waiting for me to work with it for several years now. It's still bolted to the shipping container.
o The required lot of HeNe tubes and power supplies.
o A set of EyeMagic scanners and amps. Sitting in a box waiting for me.
o Various diffraction gratings like the POLY-20, POLY-4, etc etc... No mounts or motors for them, though...
o An old self contained controller... I think it's called an Alpha Light or some such. It came with the scanner deal and I've never powered it on.
o Some homemade lumina wheels
I'm sure there's random stuff that I'm missing... But as you can see I've been collecting for a while. My end goal is to someday have an RGB projector including my gratings and lumina wheels, etc...
The biggest things I am missing:
o a set of DAC's
o Software
This is where my hobbies come into play. I've been working on a DAC and plan to build them myself. Went to school for electrical engineering, I guess it's time I apply some of that knowledge. It would be easier to buy pre-built stuff, but more costly and money is something I am lacking currently and have been for a while.
I also program for several companies. I would like to write my own software, at least to run a basic show.... Play back ILD files, make lissajous patterns on the fly, control beams and the wheels, etc. Writing software to actually draw the frames might be above what I can do. I haven't even attempted it yet. Most of my programming involves hardware interfacing and low level system programming.
Anyway, so here I am... A small pile of equipment... Some motivation... Some enjoyment.
My purposes for joining the forum are to:
o Learn. There is lots of knowledge here to soak up
o Meet new people. I'd love to meet new people to share this hobby with.
Thanks for taking the time to read my introduction.
Take care,
Brad