Reply with QuoteTook a short video. Sorry about the orientation, I'll take a new one soon.
Home built CO2 Laser
Well after a long time I am finally finished building my CO2 laser! All from scratch!
I decided I wanted to build one after reading SAMS laser faq probably around 5 years ago. My first design was based off a design I came across on the net, I was able to get output from it but it wasn't rigid enough and had issues keeping the water, vacuum and high voltage away from each other.
I had worked on a couple commercial Lasers and got some ideas from it, now everything stays aligned, high voltage doesn't jump to the water jacket and there are no vacuum leaks.
Here's a photo....
You can see the vacuum pump on the left, neon sign transformer in the middle and the water cooler on the right. I lathed and machined the laser mounts from a hard plastic to keep the mirrors electrically isolated, the electrodes/gas supply blocks are aluminum (not ideal but it works). I purchased the optics a while back from Design Research Optics, Bruce Sunderland was very helpful with amateur enthusiasts and I will definitely go back.
I am currently using a pre-mix gas bottle (Linde's Lasershield 5) which isn't the proper gas mix for a slow flow laser but it works, I plan to switch to the proper mix after this bottle runs out, this will probably improve the output power quite significantly. I haven't figured out what the current output wattage is but it will make the beam stop brick glow a hot orange without focus, with focus the brick is too bright to safely look at.
Now I just have to mount it to my CNC table make some beam steering mounts and start cutting... I haven't updated my blog site in a while but there is a little more information at www.powerautomation.net if you want to know more, or ask. It's been a really fun project and I'm finally happy with the outcome and hope it will inspire someone to build one. Although from personal experience it isn't cheaper.....
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Took a short video. Sorry about the orientation, I'll take a new one soon.
Too cool! (partial pun intended)
You've got the frickin' laaaaaser - I'll bring the shark.
It is a pity you went into DC excited laser, not RF :-(
CNC lasers, constructions, service
Re: Home built CO2 Laser
This is by far one of the nicest co2 laser build i've ever seen so far! I would like to see some gro plan photos of the laser ends.
What did you mean by high voltage jumping to water jacket? I can see o-rings there, but it is usual procedure to additionaly seal it with silicone from vacum side to avoid moisture there.
Last edited by vlupis1; 12-27-2014 at 06:18 AM.
Re: Home built CO2 Laser
if RF was not soooo expensive. this is awesome. i want to build one.
Re: Home built CO2 Laser
Do you realy think that RF is that much better than DC? Actualy, the differences are not that much if you are gonna build your own laser. DC excitation is simpler in construction, and consumes more power. Sputter contamination over a long operation time is also issue with DC, but output power is not the issue for either home built or commercial laser co2 tubes up to 100+ watt of output. If you are gonna use laser for a small cnc system DC excitation works just fine! Not so long ago RF excitation was considered to be less efficient than DC. If your CO2 laser is propperly calculated (resonator stabillity&efficiency) and you build nice powerful DC rectified-linear PSU you will be happy with your laser :-)
Re: Home built CO2 Laser
Please keep posting updates on this forum as some of us mostly come here. I agree with one of the posters above that this is one of the nicest homebuilt laser tubes I've seen. Very inspirational. I have assembled a high vacuum system as I wish to play at building a simple vacuum tube triode and so far I have got the mess of parts (Harbor Freight two stage backing pump and a Varian V70 turbo pump I rebuilt) down to 4* 10-6 Torr but still need to finish manifolds etc (Oh yeah still need to learn scientific glass blowing). It's amazing all the "other" skills you have to learn to do some of this advanced work.
You appear a little different than most of us with your workmanship more organized. Very good.
It's to bad the title doesn't reflect you are actually homebuilding the guts of the beast. A lot of folks might miss this thread thinking it's just another "assemble parts to make a laser machine" thread.
