NELEM? New England meet?

[Fearless]

Yes, it was a blast! Next year I'm bringing Gort the laser robot. Here is where Krazer works.

[Bradfo69]

Very cool. Thanks for sharing! Hopefully I'll have better luck being able to attend next year.

[galvo]

Wow - looks like it was a terrific event. Thanks for posting the photos - I hope to be able to make it for the next one.

[ImageLight]

Very cool guys... More pics and videos if you have them..

Mark

[planters]

The pics are good, but they don't do justice to the meeting. MIT is a great venue for a laser conference. The area is accessible, weekend traffic in Boston was light, the weather was cold, but sunny each day. Kraser took the first part of the day to lead a tour of the facilities. One highlight was Miters; an amalgam of a machine shop,a tech hangout and Myth Busters digs all compressed within a 400 square foot space. Here we saw krasers' work-in-progress YAG and listened to music generated by free space, high voltage atmospheric shock waves(sparks). The tour ended with a visit to the lab where the Quantum group generates high power femtosecond laser pulses and uses them to produce high harmonic ATTOSECOND narrow band X-ray pulses. Wow!

The laser shows were run in one of the many lecture halls available in a building that might have been designed by M.C. Escher (but only if he was drunk). Here we learned that the end of one Pink Floyd song sounds a lot like a fire alarm...

There were some MIT students who participated, but a low # of PL ers was a drawback. The equipment worked well for the most part (fearless had some trouble with his galvo). We experimented/played around with video combined with lasers where we compared a high end Christie multiple DLP projector and a consumer level Acer projector along with a moderately powerful RGB laser projector. I will try to post some of the videos we took of this effort.

If this happens again next year, my crew are all interested in returning and I will bring improved software and improved hardware. It really was a lot of fun.

Krazer,

Regarding terahertz, I was thinking on the way home and wondered what if you were to take an ultra fast pulse and impinged this on a flat surface covered with an array of thin parallel metal traces or sharp ridges (better field generation). If the light struck at a tangent the electrical field generated in the metal strips could be in the terahertz range given the appropriate spacing and tunable with the angle of incidence. If additionally, the plane was tipped orthogonally to the tangent then the photon wavefront might produce a traveling wave within the metal conductors and this might compensate for some dispersion. I don't know if the electrical field would naturally be biphasic, but if not then the "wires could be set up to alternate their conductance to the edge of the plate. What do you think?

You were right on the handles. We had a close call when unloading. So, I picked some up this weekend and I will install them this week.

Thanks

[Fearless]

Hi Planters
I was truly impressed with your RGB builds and was wondering if you would source out the following components:
1. Source for the dicros?
2. Source for the 532 green beam expander.
3. Source for the 1/4 wave plate.
4. Telescopic? Source?
5. Is this your spacial filter? Razor blades?
6. Telescopic? Source?
It was a great day meeting you, your family and friends, Krazer and the Miters group. Really looking forward to next year and my next build. I'm also following your foray into the muti-watt 532. Can not wait to see that in person.
Thanks,
Fearless

[planters]

somerfield,

I don't know who you are. No offense, I just don't recognize your name. If you want to participate in one of these Laser Enthusiast Meetings (LEMs), your are welcome, but not as a vendor. The problem is that access to some of these venues is as friends of the employe or student etc and not as say Coherent using the student route to market their products and avoiding the institution's sometimes substantial facility leasing charges. This is not to say a pro can not participate/educate and so on. Just be conscious of that issue and responsive to any limitations the host requests. This might be best through a PM.

[planters]

I was truly impressed with your RGB builds and was wondering if you would source out the following components:
1. Source for the dicros?
2. Source for the 532 green beam expander.
3. Source for the 1/4 wave plate.
4. Telescopic? Source?
5. Is this your spacial filter? Razor blades?
6. Telescopic? Source?

Fearless,
The dichros are Semrock clones from Edmond Optics called laser beam combiners. Get the 86-390 and the86-393. These are 1" O.D. 393 couples in 532 and the 390 couples in 445.
The 532 telescope is a 2 power, (-)25mm to (+)50mm 0 degree-vs. Edmond optics pair. These low cost lasers seem to benefit from some focusing adjustment even if you don't telescope the the beam and so a 2 power telescope reduces the divergence more like 3 times.
The 1/2 wave plate comes from a large order from a CN manufacturer. I'm out, but comparable quality is available (I have some of these in the dye based system) from Tower Optics. True zero order contacted, AR coated for the specific wavelength
The spatial filter is just razor blades and the 1 power telescope consists of two 75mm PCX lenses. Nothing magic here. I chose the longest that would fit to make alignment of the mask easier.

[planters]

I think this PM is necessary to post. Maybe my tone was a little perfunctory, but the take seems way too heated.

"thanks but no thanks,.. im not sure what if anything that really meant, it was a unneccasary comment and dismissive. I found it a bit out of place and random. I will take my offer back, I dont want to donate in a place where there is no warm welcome. I do not sell lasers and your anology is unapplicable. i do not talk on forums it is a waste of my time. You will not hear from me again and the mystery of who i am is left for others to find. "

Kraser made this concern clear to us the day of the meeting and I related this in post #58 in order to avoid any actions that could jeopardize this opportunity.

[Fearless]

Thanks so much for the info, Planters, it will help me greatly in my red and blue builds. I'll wait for you to come up with a green solution. My price point here is under $1000, if you can do multiwatt for that I'm definitely in.