Big green laser?

[Phredy1]

Hypothetically speaking, your probably not going to get much help for a Laserscope in this forum.

[mixedgas]

I don't care if your at MIT or ITT tech. That don't impress me much.

Ironically enough the last thing I want to see is a KTP in a major university lab, too many smart people wanting to try something with it. The MIT LSO would have a field day or a early heart attack with a non university, Q-switched, High rep rate, laser even near campus. If he/she even let you keep it.

If your at MIT, make sure your grades are up, Then go over to the library and watch all EIGHT VHS tapes (now probably two DVDs) of Professor Shaoul Ezekiel's laser lectures, should take 8 hours or so to view. Then come back for a quiz. One of my mentors was Ezekiel's student, so I know what to expect.

Next go get:

Sliney, D. and M. Wolbarsht: Safety with Lasers and Other Optical Sources: A Comprehensive Handbook. New York : Plenum Press, 1980.

Laser Fundamentals, William Silfvast, Cambridge University Press, 2004
(later editions prefered)

To understand the KTP doubling, you need:
Quantum Electronics, 1989, Amon Yariv

Then for yags in general,
Solid State Laser Engineering, Walter Koechner. 1994 or newer, Springer.
(Ignore the math errors, its a good book!)

A mere fingerprint on the lamp can cause it to explode. Air bubbles forming around the lamp anode will blow them. Operating the lamp without a proper cool down, then restarting the lamp the next day at a higher current can pop them. The lamp often will take the rod or the psu with it. If the DI water is too good, the housing corrodes from dissolved oxygen. If the DI water is too conductive, you get electrolysis and loose the reflector quality. None of this is in the manual, either.

Its a major can of worms to run a KTP. A long series of small events must happen in the correct order and at the correct time for one to function. Even shutdown must be in the right order, or over the long term things blow.

KTPs leak IR like a sieve, and 1064 IR is hard to visualize, silicon based cameras can barely detect it, if they see it at all. If the IR hits a unprotected eye, the last thing you see is a flash of dim red, and you will probably hear a pop as the back of the eye ablates, creating a shockwave. This is all well documented.


Listen, the thing can only be used under a limited number of circumstances, under extreme safety precautions, and its a one trick pony. The beam quality is poor, so its a lousy materials working laser. The beam wanders around during operation, so its a lousy lab laser. It mode hops faster then you can say "warp drive", so no holography. and it is very expensive to run. It does not focus down well either. You need 300-500$ in QUALITY safety gear just to be around it. (fire extinguisher, CERTIFIED goggles, beam block, TWO thermal power meters for tuning, controlled access room, IR visualization system, UHP grade cleaning materials)

It does 6 things well. A. Injure unsuspecting people B. Drain your wallet C. Make nice beam shows in huge arenas under certain VERY controlled circumstances, but it cannot do graphics. D. Burn vaginal warts, prostate tissue, and power meter adsorbers E. Attract government interest. F. Set walls, skin, and clothing, on fire.

Your much better off with 1-2 watts of CW visible or 10-20 watts of CO2, you can at least DO something useful with them and show them to people under controlled circumstances..

I know I sound mean about this, but this is NOT a beginners laser. It is a highly specialized, otherwise useless, monolithic money pit.

Nough said.

Steve

[Phredy1]

Just a thought here..... If you want a mega powerful laser, build a 445nm blue. Diodes are dirt cheap. You could build what you could afford and make it workable and as you can afford more, add more diodes.

Being at MIT there should be enough knowledge between MIT and this forum to build an awesome 445nm projector. Then you would have solid state, a portable projector and mega power. Be interesting to see what the guys at MIT and you could come up with. It might impress all of us!

[laser_freak]

...
Nough said.

Steve

You've scared me away from even looking at pictures of laserscopes

[Phredy1]

You've scared me away from even looking at pictures of laserscopes

I touched one once, but it wasn't plugged in. I still have nightmares from that experience.

[bwang]

I don't care if your at MIT or ITT tech. That don't impress me much.

Ironically enough the last thing I want to see is a KTP in a major university lab, too many smart people wanting to try something with it. The MIT LSO would have a field day or a early heart attack with a non university, Q-switched, High rep rate, laser even near campus. If he/she even let you keep it.

If your at MIT, make sure your grades are up, Then go over to the library and watch all EIGHT VHS tapes (now probably two DVDs) of Professor Shaoul Ezekiel's laser lectures, should take 8 hours or so to view. Then come back for a quiz. One of my mentors was Ezekiel's student, so I know what to expect.

Next go get:

Sliney, D. and M. Wolbarsht: Safety with Lasers and Other Optical Sources: A Comprehensive Handbook. New York : Plenum Press, 1980.

Laser Fundamentals, William Silfvast, Cambridge University Press, 2004
(later editions prefered)

To understand the KTP doubling, you need:
Quantum Electronics, 1989, Amon Yariv

Then for yags in general,
Solid State Laser Engineering, Walter Koechner. 1994 or newer, Springer.
(Ignore the math errors, its a good book!)

A mere fingerprint on the lamp can cause it to explode. Air bubbles forming around the lamp anode will blow them. Operating the lamp without a proper cool down, then restarting the lamp the next day at a higher current can pop them. The lamp often will take the rod or the psu with it. If the DI water is too good, the housing corrodes from dissolved oxygen. If the DI water is too conductive, you get electrolysis and loose the reflector quality. None of this is in the manual, either.

Its a major can of worms to run a KTP. A long series of small events must happen in the correct order and at the correct time for one to function. Even shutdown must be in the right order, or over the long term things blow.

KTPs leak IR like a sieve, and 1064 IR is hard to visualize, silicon based cameras can barely detect it, if they see it at all. If the IR hits a unprotected eye, the last thing you see is a flash of dim red, and you will probably hear a pop as the back of the eye ablates, creating a shockwave. This is all well documented.


Listen, the thing can only be used under a limited number of circumstances, under extreme safety precautions, and its a one trick pony. The beam quality is poor, so its a lousy materials working laser. The beam wanders around during operation, so its a lousy lab laser. It mode hops faster then you can say "warp drive", so no holography. and it is very expensive to run. It does not focus down well either. You need 300-500$ in QUALITY safety gear just to be around it. (fire extinguisher, CERTIFIED goggles, beam block, TWO thermal power meters for tuning, controlled access room, IR visualization system, UHP grade cleaning materials)

It does 6 things well. A. Injure unsuspecting people B. Drain your wallet C. Make nice beam shows in huge arenas under certain VERY controlled circumstances, but it cannot do graphics. D. Burn vaginal warts, prostate tissue, and power meter adsorbers E. Attract government interest. F. Set walls, skin, and clothing, on fire.

Your much better off with 1-2 watts of CW visible or 10-20 watts of CO2, you can at least DO something useful with them and show them to people under controlled circumstances..

I know I sound mean about this, but this is NOT a beginners laser. It is a highly specialized, otherwise useless, monolithic money pit.

Nough said.

Steve

Hmm...you've successfully convinced me that Laserscopes are not the self-contained, plug 'n play units I thought them to be, which makes me think twice about getting one

Just a thought here..... If you want a mega powerful laser, build a 445nm blue. Diodes are dirt cheap. You could build what you could afford and make it workable and as you can afford more, add more diodes.

Being at MIT there should be enough knowledge between MIT and this forum to build an awesome 445nm projector. Then you would have solid state, a portable projector and mega power. Be interesting to see what the guys at MIT and you could come up with. It might impress all of us!

I've been trying to convince myself to do this for a while now. I think you might have given me the last push needed to spend $$ on multiple blue diodes
Or maybe I should get a water-cooled argon instead...
What's the biggest argon that can be run on a reasonable amount of power? I assume the non-qswitchedness of an argon greatly reduces the risk of ablated flesh.

[danielbriggs]

You poke your fingers in the Laserscope. I'll stand far away and watch....

Been there, done that, but got DI all over the proverbial t-shirt

What's the biggest argon that can be run on a reasonable amount of power?

Define.

[QUAZAR]

How much power do you have available and is it single or 3 phase?

[Stoney3K]

Hmm...you've successfully convinced me that Laserscopes are not the self-contained, plug 'n play units I thought them to be, which makes me think twice about getting one


I've been trying to convince myself to do this for a while now. I think you might have given me the last push needed to spend $$ on multiple blue diodes
Or maybe I should get a water-cooled argon instead...
What's the biggest argon that can be run on a reasonable amount of power? I assume the non-qswitchedness of an argon greatly reduces the risk of ablated flesh.

If you haven't worked with anything *other* than diode or DPSS lasers, I would advise against a Laserscope and just go for a medium-frame argon or Ar/Kr instead. The logistics of running and getting a Scope up to show-ready condition are a pain in the neck, and the safety concerns are mentioned here over and over before.

Argons are a great piece of engineering and even they can pose their own challenges to get them up and running -- if you have trouble aligning an Argon tube, you're probably going to kill yourself trying to tune a Laserscope.

There are a lot of Argon or mixed gas tubes out there that can run on single phase supply and still output a nice amount of power for the money spent. And the infrastructure for an Argon is already a bit more challenging than most diode projectors.

For some pointers to some models to search for: Spectra-Physics 165 or 168 (if you have enough power available) are quite common, and there are some Coherent and Lexel tubes out there which would be suitable as well -- maybe Pat or Steve would be the kind of people to talk to for those. Aside from the smaller ALC68-style air cooled tubes you can just run on your desk.

[bwang]

Hmm...the Coherent I90 and Spectra Physics 168 look quite nice. How much current do the
power supplies draw at 5W?