Some people have all the cool toys in their home!
Thanks for sharing the photos. You've got something that many here on the forum have dreamed about owning for a long time. Well done!
Adam
A truly Frankenstein monster of a laser! I would set that laser up for safe demonstrations in public to show people its power. Putting a variety of things at the focus to show what happens. Maybe make some You Tube videos. Ballistic Light!
You, sir, are my laser-building hero.
Thanks for such a kind response!
BTW, yesterday I've realigned the resonator and approached the limit of my current system -- 400J of output energy, I've measured it with an energy meter. But on the other hand focusing mecame much much worse and it hardly melts through a coin. But the holes in coins are relatively big, sumetimes up to 1mm or more, if I make a couple of shots in the same place. Is there any chance to make the beam single-mode with reasonable loss of energy? Will a simple diaphragm in the resonator work?
Continuing playing with my laser blaster. Today I managed to penetrate 6mm thick aluminium plate with two shots at 450J output energy. It is quite spectacular -- the beam causes blindingly bright flash of burning aluminium with a huge jet of plasma with a particularly loud bang. Also I improved focusing by reducing the spherical aberration of the lens. The position of the lens affects this aberration. When a curved surface faces the beam, aberration is less significant. This lead to easier coin penetration -- now I need roughly 200J instead of 450 for it.
Nice! Looks like you are having good fun. Now can you please reduce this to a small handheld size and sell it to the rest of us?
A video would be nice if it won’t ruin the camera.
David
"Help, help, I'm being repressed!"
So awesome dude! Be careful and enjoy your hard work. Very, very cool!
Wow! I hope you keep a fire extinguisher close at hand!
-David
"Help, help, I'm being repressed!"