How to build a High Powered Burning Violet Laser

This tutorial shows you how to build a 80mW-100mW violet laser module for about $30 from easily obtainable parts.

 
Parts List

A PHR-803T Sled
A 100mA Driver (The seller no longer sells plain 100mA drivers so you will have to buy an adjustable driver and    set the current yourself. Instructions for doing this are on that site.)
An Aixiz Module

Tools

Vise

Soldering Iron

Part 1 - Extraction

Start by pulling the Metal Protector off of the sled.


From there you'll see two laser diodes exposed, the one with three pins is the violet laser diode, the one with four pins is a weak Red/Ir combined diode. Practice extracting on the red/IR, if you mess up one the red/IR one it won't matter because that diode is useless for our purposes.


Next pull out the laser diode in its mini heatsink, you may have to put a little force into breaking it off from the rest of the sled. Be careful not to touch the diode during extracting because the glass window on the front can break easily


After that pull the diode in its mini heatsink out by grabbing the little ribbon cable and pulling on it.


To get the diode out of its little heatsink, grab both sides of the heatsink with two pairs of pliers and twist in opposite directions, this will crack the heatsink metal and the diode should fall out. If it doesn't just drop out, clip at the heatsink with some diagonal cutters (or something like them) until the diode falls out.


Now that you have your diode exposed, treat it with care because it is very fragile, the glass window on the front of the laser diode shatters easily.

Part 2 - Pressing the Module

Now drop the laser diode in the top half of the Aixiz module, put the back half of the module over the diode pins so the diode pins fit through the small hole in the back of the module.


Put this diode/module "sandwich" in a vice, try to keep the laser diode as aligned straight with the Aixiz module as much as possible.


Tighten the vice until the laser diode is flush with the Aixiz module (the little PCB on the back won't be flush, it will stick out a little which is fine)

Part 3 - Soldering Everything Together

Now put the top half of the Aixiz module in the vice


Now turn on your soldering gun and put a blob of solder on the tip of the gun


Drop the blob of solder on the diode pins and use you needle nose pliers to pull the PCB off while the solder is melted. Don't keep the soldering gun on the laser diode pins for more than a few seconds because your laser diode will die if it is heated too much.


For what you are going to do next, you will need to use this pin-out diagram.


To make things easier, you can just break off the "Not Used" pin of the laser diode


Now solder the "+LD" of the driver to the positive pin on the Laser Diode, and solder the "-GD" of the driver to the negative pin of the laser diode.


Now screw on the back half of the Aixiz module


Put the spring and lens back in the module


Grab a power supply that puts out 7.25v-12v, a 9v battery works perfect for this. Hook it up to the laser module and you are ready for some playing around!

Matches should light with ease!

Here's a video overview of the process: