the beginning of something wonderfully blue

[h2so4]

Jonny was a chemists son,
but now he is no more,
for what he thought was H2O,
was H2So4..

pretty pessimistic, isn't it?

[dxs]

Woww !! Did you buy previously the small set available on fleebay? Did you get it working? If so, any pics ?? ;-)

[frank_1257]

I spent much time on the phone with a Fujian Castech engineer representative out of California. They make these kits seen on ebay.

If you goto castech.com you will see this kit .

The seller on ebay has quoted figures for huge lbo crystals that are not included in the kit and even figures for a sapphire laser pumping LBO.

It's all a bunch of psycho babble hype to confuse potential buyers.

The simple facts are with a good Fast Axis Collimated 2-4 watt 808nm temperature and wavelength controlled diode, you may get 70 mw of blue if you get everything aligned perfectly.

It is possible to get more output if the LBO is heated properly to just the right temperature and everything is hermetically sealed to prevent damage to the LBO.

For those without chemical backgrounds LBO is hygroscopic which means that humidity/water in the air bonds to molecules of the Lithium Triborate permanently slowly softening it and destroying its capability to double 946nm to 473nm.

The big boys that make lasers do not allways spend a bunch of money on high end bulky mounts for everything to align just right.

What is done very often is a very high precision 5 axis micro manipulator is used to position the crystals and optics into the best possible positions and then everything is permanently glued in place on a sled or rail.

Its going to be very hard to achieve this kind of alignment in a hobbyist setting not impossible just very difficult to reproduce.

Someone serious about using one of these kits may be well served by retrofitting a dead laser frame from an old green laser.

Well unless you are a good machinist with time on your hands.