Powerful laser do it yourself in one evening

Briefly.

Hello ladies and gentlemen. Today I open a series of articles devoted to high-power lasers, for habra search says that people are looking for similar articles. I want to tell you how you can make quite a powerful laser at home, and also teach you to use this power not just for the sake of “shine on the clouds.”

A warning!

The article describes the manufacture of a powerful laser ( 300mW ~ power of 500 Chinese pointers ), which can harm your health and the health of others! Be extremely careful! Use special safety glasses and do not aim the laser beam at people or animals !

We learn.

On Habré, just a couple of times , articles about Dragon Lasers portable lasers, such as Hulk , skipped . In this article I will tell you how you can make a laser that is not inferior in power to the most models sold in this store.

Cooking.

First you need to prepare all the components:
- non-working (or working) DVD-RW drive with a recording speed of 16x or higher;
- capacitors 100 pF and 100 mF;
- resistor 2-5 Ohm;
- Three AAA batteries;
- soldering iron and wires;
- collimator (or Chinese pointer);
- steel LED flashlight.
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This is a necessary minimum for making a simple driver model. The driver is, in fact, a board that will output our laser diode to the necessary power. Connecting the power supply directly to the laser diode is not worth it - will fail. The laser diode must be powered by current, not voltage.

A collimator is, in fact, a module with a lens that reduces all radiation into a narrow beam. Ready collimators can be purchased at radio stores. In such, there is immediately a convenient place to install a laser diode, and the cost is 200-500 rubles.


You can use a collimator from a Chinese pointer, however, the laser diode will be difficult to fix, and the body of the collimator will probably be made of metallized plastic. So our diode will be badly cooled. But it is possible. This option can be viewed at the end of the article.

We do.

First you need to get the laser diode itself. This is a very fragile and small part of our DVD-RW drive - be careful. A powerful red laser diode is in the carriage of our drive. It can be distinguished from the weak by a radiator of a larger size than that of a conventional IR diode.

It is recommended to use an antistatic bracelet, since the laser diode is very sensitive to static voltage. If there is no bracelet, you can wrap the diode's leads with a thin wire while it waits for installation in the case.

According to this scheme, you need to solder the driver.

Do not confuse polarity! The laser diode will also fail instantly if the supply voltage is incorrect.

The diagram shows a 200 mF capacitor, however, 50-100 mF is enough for portability.

We try.

Before installing the laser diode and assembling everything in the case, check the performance of the driver. Connect another laser diode (idle or second from the drive) and measure the current with a multimeter. Depending on the speed characteristics, the current should be selected correctly. For 16x models, 300-350mA is quite suitable. For the fastest 22x, you can even submit 500mA, but by a completely different driver, the production of which I plan to describe in another article.


It looks awful, but it works!

Aesthetics.

The laser assembled on weight can only boast in front of the same crazy techno-maniacs, but for beauty and convenience it is better to assemble it into a convenient case. There is already better to choose yourself, as you like. I mounted the whole circuit in a conventional LED flashlight. Its dimensions do not exceed 10x4cm. However, I do not advise carrying it with you: you never know what claims the relevant authorities can make. And it is better to store in a special case, so that the sensitive lens is not dusty.

This is an option with minimal cost - a collimator from a Chinese pointer is used:


Using a factory-made module will allow you to get the following results:


The laser beam is visible in the evening:


And, of course, in the dark:

Maybe.

Yes, I want to tell and show in the following articles how such lasers can be used. How to make much more powerful copies that can cut metal and wood, and not just set fire to matches and melt plastic. How to make holograms and scan items for 3D Studio Max models. How to make powerful green or blue lasers. The scope of application of lasers is quite wide, and one article can not do here.

Need to remember.

Do not forget about safety! Lasers are not a toy! Take care of your eyes!