If you need assistance, please send an email to forum at 4hv dot org. To ensure your email is not marked as spam, please include the phrase "4hv help" in the subject line. You can also find assistance via IRC, at irc.shadowworld.net, room #hvcomm.
Support 4hv.org!
Donate:
4hv.org is hosted on a dedicated server. Unfortunately, this server costs and we rely on the help of site members to keep 4hv.org running. Please consider donating. We will place your name on the thanks list and you'll be helping to keep 4hv.org alive and free for everyone. Members whose names appear in red bold have donated recently. Green bold denotes those who have recently donated to keep the server carbon neutral.
Special Thanks To:
Aaron Holmes
Aaron Wheeler
Adam Horden
Alan Scrimgeour
Andre
Andrew Haynes
Anonymous000
asabase
Austin Weil
barney
Barry
Bert Hickman
Bill Kukowski
Blitzorn
Brandon Paradelas
Bruce Bowling
BubeeMike
Byong Park
Cesiumsponge
Chris F.
Chris Hooper
Corey Worthington
Derek Woodroffe
Dalus
Dan Strother
Daniel Davis
Daniel Uhrenholt
datasheetarchive
Dave Billington
Dave Marshall
David F.
Dennis Rogers
drelectrix
Dr. John Gudenas
Dr. Spark
E.TexasTesla
eastvoltresearch
Eirik Taylor
Erik Dyakov
Erlend^SE
Finn Hammer
Firebug24k
GalliumMan
Gary Peterson
George Slade
GhostNull
Gordon Mcknight
Graham Armitage
Grant
GreySoul
Henry H
IamSmooth
In memory of Leo Powning
Jacob Cash
James Howells
James Pawson
Jeff Greenfield
Jeff Thomas
Jesse Frost
Jim Mitchell
jlr134
Joe Mastroianni
John Forcina
John Oberg
John Willcutt
Jon Newcomb
klugesmith
Leslie Wright
Lutz Hoffman
Mads Barnkob
Martin King
Mats Karlsson
Matt Gibson
Matthew Guidry
mbd
Michael D'Angelo
Mikkel
mileswaldron
mister_rf
Neil Foster
Nick de Smith
Nick Soroka
nicklenorp
Nik
Norman Stanley
Patrick Coleman
Paul Brodie
Paul Jordan
Paul Montgomery
Ped
Peter Krogen
Peter Terren
PhilGood
Richard Feldman
Robert Bush
Royce Bailey
Scott Fusare
Scott Newman
smiffy
Stella
Steven Busic
Steve Conner
Steve Jones
Steve Ward
Sulaiman
Thomas Coyle
Thomas A. Wallace
Thomas W
Timo
Torch
Ulf Jonsson
vasil
Vaxian
vladi mazzilli
wastehl
Weston
William Kim
William N.
William Stehl
Wesley Venis
The aforementioned have contributed financially to the continuing triumph of 4hv.org. They are deserving of my most heartfelt thanks.
Registered Member #1521
Joined: Thu Jun 05 2008, 10:46AM
Location: Hungary
Posts: 128
Could please someone tell me, what is the right gas mixture for a sealed CO2 laser, and which company is the cheapest to buy from such a mixture? I have contacted our local gas company "Messer" but they offered me a horribly high price at about $1600 for a 2litre 160bar cylinder of gas mixture that contained about 3% of Xe gas.
Registered Member #56
Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 05:02AM
Location: Southern Califorina, USA
Posts: 2445
It is my understanding for sealed tubes, unlike flowing gas ones, require very careful mixing and just buying a strait bottle of mixed gas won't necessarily give a good lifetime. Traditionally you would have separate tanks for He N2 CO2 H20 Xe CO etc and fill with separate tanks. Furthermore, you need to have very pure gases, which further raises the price. You might be able to get away with a bottle of normal CO2 laser mix, and a separate H2O and Xe source (or whatever the tube in question is supposed to be filled with), you only need a tiny amount so a small 'lecture bottle' would probably do the job.
Registered Member #311
Joined: Sun Mar 12 2006, 08:28PM
Location:
Posts: 253
You would also need a way to accurately measure how much of each gas you added, after you'd pulled a decent vacuum. Unless you have all the gear, probably better to get a pro to do it. As mentioned above, the alt.lasers newsgroup is the best place to ask.
Registered Member #902
Joined: Sun Jul 15 2007, 08:17PM
Location: Pacific Northwest USA
Posts: 1042
in Scientific American's Amateur Scientist series, they featured a whole several articles on homemade gas lasers, including a CO2 gas laser with a home filled tube- I'll see if I can dig it up, but I'm sure you can find it online
Registered Member #56
Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 05:02AM
Location: Southern Califorina, USA
Posts: 2445
The key difference here is most hobby tubes are 'flowing gas', that is you hook it up to a big tank and slowly flow gas through the laser. This is simple, and the gas mix does not need to be very tightly controlled or pure so it is cheap.
It sounds like Omegalabs wants to fill a more modern 'sealed' type tube, which is filled and then runs for set period of time before it needs to be refilled again--these tubes are much more popular in modern days because they are smaller/more convenient, but as noted above without the proper tools to get exactly the right gas mix they are not trivial to refill on a hobby budget.
Registered Member #1521
Joined: Thu Jun 05 2008, 10:46AM
Location: Hungary
Posts: 128
Thank you all for the answers. It seems to me, that I should have to build a flow type laser, simply because it is cheaper than the sealed type. I found a type of catalyst NASA developed, for CO2 lasers, to recycle the laser gas. Unfortunately I can't find it now. If you don't mind, I would have another question. How can I calculate the transparency of the ZnSe output coupler, for a (100W optical output) 1200mm long resonator. Does it have an equation?
This site is powered by e107, which is released under the GNU GPL License. All work on this site, except where otherwise noted, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5 License. By submitting any information to this site, you agree that anything submitted will be so licensed. Please read our Disclaimer and Policies page for information on your rights and responsibilities regarding this site.
Cheap CO2 laser mixture?
