Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Happy new year!
Happy new year! May this New Year bring you health, prosperity, happiness and love. Let's hope that 2009 will be much better than 2008, but not better than 2010 :)
Wednesday, December 24, 2008
Merry Christmas!
Merry Christmas everyone! Ho ho ho!
I hope you'll receive some nice gifts :) I have to go now, the cat has climbed in the Christmas Tree again!
I hope you'll receive some nice gifts :) I have to go now, the cat has climbed in the Christmas Tree again!
Friday, October 24, 2008
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
HAPPY CAPS LOCK DAY!
YUP, TODAY IT'S CAPS LOCK DAY! A DAY DEDICATED TO ALL THOSE WHO THINK THAT IF YOU WRITE WITH CAPS OTHERS WILL UNDERSTAND BETTER WHAT YOU SAY. WELL, NO! SO PLEASE STOP USING CAPS :)
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Nd:YAG rod
Look what I bought:
[insert image here]
A used (but looks like new) Nd:YAG rod. At 5 x 76 mm with 1.0% doping it's a pretty powerful rod that should yield a few watts of laser in combination with the right flash lamp. Another nice touch is the AR coating on the heads.
I bought this rod from eBay.
Well, for the moment I can't do anything with it, just admire it's nice pink color :) so that's all the details I can give for now. More later, when I'll have a lamp and mirrors to experiment with.
[insert image here]
A used (but looks like new) Nd:YAG rod. At 5 x 76 mm with 1.0% doping it's a pretty powerful rod that should yield a few watts of laser in combination with the right flash lamp. Another nice touch is the AR coating on the heads.
I bought this rod from eBay.
Well, for the moment I can't do anything with it, just admire it's nice pink color :) so that's all the details I can give for now. More later, when I'll have a lamp and mirrors to experiment with.
Motor capacitors
Look what I bought:
[insert image here]
A brand new set of motor capacitors. All are rated at 450V and have 10 uF (4 pcs), 40 uF (1 pc) and 100 uF (3 pcs). They are designed as startup-capacitors for electric motors, but I intend to use them for powering my lasers. Although they are rated at 450V, I'm going to charge them at 1000V. My friend Bogdan already tested them at this voltage and they didn't blow up in his face, so it should be ok.
The small ones (10 uF) will be used in a voltage multiplier for charging te other caps. They will rise the voltage from 220 V to 880 V (I think I should add two more, to reach 1320 V, but that's 3 times more the rating of the caps and I'm a little afraid to do it).
The medium capacitor (40 uF) can hold a carge of 20 J at 1000V and should be ok for powering the SSY-1.
Now the interesting part: the largest capacitors can hold 3 x 50 J and should be just fine for powering the larger laser.
Unfortunately Bogdan tested these capacitors and they didn't discharge fast enough so his SSY-1 couldn't lase. On the other hand, on Sam's page I found an article stating that they should work just fine. I don't know what to say... I'll perform some tests and update this post.
[insert image here]
A brand new set of motor capacitors. All are rated at 450V and have 10 uF (4 pcs), 40 uF (1 pc) and 100 uF (3 pcs). They are designed as startup-capacitors for electric motors, but I intend to use them for powering my lasers. Although they are rated at 450V, I'm going to charge them at 1000V. My friend Bogdan already tested them at this voltage and they didn't blow up in his face, so it should be ok.
The small ones (10 uF) will be used in a voltage multiplier for charging te other caps. They will rise the voltage from 220 V to 880 V (I think I should add two more, to reach 1320 V, but that's 3 times more the rating of the caps and I'm a little afraid to do it).
The medium capacitor (40 uF) can hold a carge of 20 J at 1000V and should be ok for powering the SSY-1.
Now the interesting part: the largest capacitors can hold 3 x 50 J and should be just fine for powering the larger laser.
Unfortunately Bogdan tested these capacitors and they didn't discharge fast enough so his SSY-1 couldn't lase. On the other hand, on Sam's page I found an article stating that they should work just fine. I don't know what to say... I'll perform some tests and update this post.
Monday, October 20, 2008
Multimeter
Look what I bought:
[insert image here]
A brand new multimeter. Even if I bought it a few weeks ago, I thought I should present it because I've mentioned it in a previous post.
I was glad when I saw that this multimeter can measure temperature, capacitors and frequency besides the normal stuff. Also it has extended range: the old multimeter couldn't measure the 1900V from the CCFL, but this one could (well, the manual says that even if it can measure up to 2000V, the user shouldn't connect more than 1000V because the internal circuitry might fail).
In theory everything is very nice, but when I arrived home I saw that it's not that precise. It shows about 180 ohms for a 200 ohms resistor, 15 pF for a 22 pF capacitor and the thing I find the most annoying, it doesn't show 0 when connecting the two probes together. Well, you can't have them all :)
I like very much the temperature measuring function. It uses a K-type probe and when that isn't connected it shows the ambient temperature. Nice! You can see it below with the probe attached, displaying the room temperature (brr, 19 degrees Celsius).
[insert image here]
To test the temperature probe I've measured the hot and cold water from the dispenser. It was 10 degrees respectively 70 degrees Celsius. I don't know how precise is this, but I tried...
I haven't tested yet the frequency function. It states that it can measure up to 20 KHz. This should be easy to test: just set up a timer on an AVR to output a fixed frequency and see what the multimeter shows. I hope it won't display 13 KHz for a 15 KHz signal :(
Hmm, if I think about it, the old multimeter was better as it was more accurate (even if it didn't have so many functions). Too bad it blew up ;)
Summary:
Price: 38 ron (15$)
Pros: can measure temperature, capacitors and frequency
Cons: not very precise
[insert image here]
A brand new multimeter. Even if I bought it a few weeks ago, I thought I should present it because I've mentioned it in a previous post.
I was glad when I saw that this multimeter can measure temperature, capacitors and frequency besides the normal stuff. Also it has extended range: the old multimeter couldn't measure the 1900V from the CCFL, but this one could (well, the manual says that even if it can measure up to 2000V, the user shouldn't connect more than 1000V because the internal circuitry might fail).
In theory everything is very nice, but when I arrived home I saw that it's not that precise. It shows about 180 ohms for a 200 ohms resistor, 15 pF for a 22 pF capacitor and the thing I find the most annoying, it doesn't show 0 when connecting the two probes together. Well, you can't have them all :)
I like very much the temperature measuring function. It uses a K-type probe and when that isn't connected it shows the ambient temperature. Nice! You can see it below with the probe attached, displaying the room temperature (brr, 19 degrees Celsius).
[insert image here]
To test the temperature probe I've measured the hot and cold water from the dispenser. It was 10 degrees respectively 70 degrees Celsius. I don't know how precise is this, but I tried...
I haven't tested yet the frequency function. It states that it can measure up to 20 KHz. This should be easy to test: just set up a timer on an AVR to output a fixed frequency and see what the multimeter shows. I hope it won't display 13 KHz for a 15 KHz signal :(
Hmm, if I think about it, the old multimeter was better as it was more accurate (even if it didn't have so many functions). Too bad it blew up ;)
Summary:
Price: 38 ron (15$)
Pros: can measure temperature, capacitors and frequency
Cons: not very precise
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