Show off your Laser projector !

[Stoney3K]

That is pretty impressive for something that compact. Just plunk it in a bag along with a 9V battery and go to the local party venue

Your diodes are quite powerful (100-200mW for the red and Bluray), so where are you losing those LOTS of power? Since the green unit by itself is 50mW, you could probably up the output quite a notch. Or is it just a heat dissipation issue?

A unit with diodes like that could easily go 300mW to 0,5W. The power composition seems to be quite similar to mine, which is actually targeted at 0,5-0,6W.

[c4r0]

The issue are crappy dichros from optical drives I can get only 20mW of 405nm (after acrylic colimatiing lens and dichros) and that limits green to 3mW and red to 8mW if I set the powers for proper white ballance. I'm going to buy better dichros and build 650/532/488 0.5W RGB, this little guy was actually just for warm-up

[Stoney3K]

The issue are crappy dichros from optical drives I can get only 20mW of 405nm (after acrylic colimatiing lens and dichros) and that limits green to 3mW and red to 8mW if I set the powers for proper white ballance. I'm going to buy better dichros and build 650/532/488 0.5W RGB, this little guy was actually just for warm-up

Well, if you re-use your old laser diodes and get some good dichro's and collimating optics, you could hit 0,4W or maybe even 0,5W (but then you're pushing the 405 to its max).

I'd stay away from the 488's these days, they're damn expensive for the amount of light they put out. Or it's just the 405's that are so cheap, either way, the 405's still give quite a good color combo. You can always add a 488 with a spare dichro if you want a deeper gamut on the blue end, but RGV is quite good for 9 out of 10 shows.

[ElektroFreak]

Perhaps he's referring to an argon for the 488..

[c4r0]

Perhaps he's referring to an argon for the 488..

Yep, but Stoney3K is referring to an argon too i think The thing is that I already have a 80mW argon (link). I don't want to stay with 405nm because it's really poorly visible (or maybe there's something wrong with my eyes? ). 473 would be perfect ofcourse but it's too expensive for me. I have an argon laying under my desk so why not to make use of it? I will always be able to change it for a nice 405nm module when needed.

[Stoney3K]

Perhaps he's referring to an argon for the 488..

That would actually be a pretty cool job, combining a diode rig with an argon tube for the blue. Would make kind of a bulky unit though.

I'd get a few of those 405 modules anyway if I were you, you can't really go wrong for $30. Even if you use the 488nm for your primary blue tone, a 405 in the 100-200mW range could really extend your colour output to a more deep blue if you need it. Besides, you finally get to use that seventh ILDA channel

[colouredmirrorball]

But if you use an Argon, do you need an AOM then?
I was thinking of using an Argon as blue too but someone said I need an AOM because I couldn't blank the Argon otherwise.

[Stoney3K]

But if you use an Argon, do you need an AOM then?
I was thinking of using an Argon as blue too but someone said I need an AOM because I couldn't blank the Argon otherwise.

Yep, you will.

Either that, or you need to conjure up some ingenious way of modifying the power supply to blank the beam (or wave your finger in the beam in the right timing...), but I wouldn't really recommend that

Can you see the reason we're using diode lasers these days?

[c4r0]

I know that I need something for beam modulation. I don't have AOM but a Pockels cell is on it's way already The biggest problems with using an argon in a projector is that it increases the projector's weight a few times and whole thing becomes very noisy (cooling for argon and it's PSU). I will also need to add 1kW to power consumption ofcourse

BTW isn't it 'a bit' off topic ... ?

[Diachi]

I'm planning on building a projector using an argon and a red module too. It may be bigger and noisier, but that colour is just unbeatable!