I realized that I’d be able to do this at reduced daylight, and it’d STILL look awesome!! 🙂
The daylight version removes a lot of the glare and you can see the beam and reflection on the bottom of the tub better 🙂
Full explanation: see my previous post 🙂
#stem #laserfun #laser #engineer #physics #kitchenscience #science #sciencematters
As light enters a more dense medium, it will bend because of the speed reduction in that medium. A bit like if your right wheel enters the gravel next to the road, the car wants to go there.
Now here comes the magic:
1) My sugar solution is a beautiful gradient: more dense towards the bottom, more watery towards the surface. This causes the light to bend in a nice curve, finally hitting the bottom.
2) I managed to find a balance where I have a nice density gradient and none or little sugar on the bottom. So now the bottom becomes a mirror because of the water and acrylic boundary.
The light will now reflect from the bottom, starting a new curve.
This will go on for the entire length of the container, or until I run out of light (it spreads, disperses, along the way). You can see I barely got started on the second jump.
Oh and the really cool thing: occasionally radio signals do the same, if the atmospheric conditions are just right 🙂
Powering up a blue laser diode to 500mW 🙂
Note how it acts like a poor LED until 150mA, at which point the laser process fires 🔥
The 505B is an accurate, adjustable current source which allows for external modulation input.
It’s designed for low-noise (<1.5uA RMS) and it has a photo diode input, so with a calibrated light sensor, you can achieve constant power regulation.
Last but not least: it’s designed for maximum safety with two interlock circuits, one with a physical key.
Its internal design has a complex redundant output circuit, which ensures that the laser will NEVER illuminate unintended and it will NEVER exceed the chosen power setting.
A fancy current source indeed, a laboratory grade instrument 🙂
This video was shot wearing the appropriate safety glasses, be VERY CAREFUL when experimenting with lasers. Even a short duration reflection at this power level WILL damage your vision 🚨‼️
#electronicsengineering #electronics #physics #stem #laserfun #funwithlasers #ee #testandmeasurement
