3D Printing your laser beam viewing cards
Low-cost viewing cards for aligning Yb-based NIR pump lasers (1030 nm fundamental).
- File type
- STL
- Version
- v2.2
Aligning a laser experiment can be a challenging task. One essential part for the success are viewing cards and alignment tools to control the propagation of the beam. In case of the state of the art pump lasers that usually means aligning a Yb based system with a fundamental wavelength of 1030 nm – not in the visible regime. Usually, you need to rely on fluorescent viewing cards. Those cards usually cost 70 €+ a piece and the more you have the better. At some point that can be hard to justify when negotiating the budget for such activities.
But that's not necessary. After being frustrated because the one viewing card I had was full of burned spots I randomly checked other materials for their fluorescence in the NIR and found a couple of interesting things:
