Starting a new post as this is what I'm talking about.
It's different lasers that have a 510 adapter that is also used as a heat-sink. I'm not talking about some little red dot cat toy.
Take a look at this forum. There are over 38,000 members (but this does not mean active):
http://laserpointerforums.com/
The most important issue is if you decide to get into lasers you MUST read all the safety concerns. There's been a disgusting amount of issues with people shining them at aircraft which is a federal offense. There are glasses specifically made for different wavelengths referred to as nm which in simple terms means what colors they cover to protect your eyes. As with anything else, you generally get what you pay for and better glasses cost more.
Anything 5mW and above can and will damage eyesight and they are NOT toys. Yes they are very "cool" for lack of another word especially when you can see the entire beam that looks like it goes on forever. Think Star Trek phaser. For some this may be the ultimate mod attachment but you MUST understand and respect the safety aspects.
There's certainly plenty of fun to be had and there are other things you can do with them besides pointing but for me that's cool enough.
I am NOT here to ask anyone to join the laser forum or purchase anything and again, I have nothing to do with the units themselves other than finding information for the different ways we can use the mods with them. A regular mechanical mod will work just fine but wouldn't it be great if you could adjust the output and not just have an on/off/momentary. There are lots of custom units being made and some can change power output like a low/medium/high and maybe strobe too but they aren't very common. You guys have existing tech that can already do some of these things and the designs of your mods which we would just call a host opens up a whole new area of great looking hosts. Just like the flashlight community who are always looking for something different so are we and most of the hosts we use are flashlights just rebuilt with a heat-sink and different driver boards. So you can see how we all mix together and use batteries and hosts/mods that are quite similar.
For reasons that I personally don't know, PWM causes an issue (at least with the one I have) when trying to power at lower voltages with the laser strobing really fast instead of a steady output. The units that have just a mechanical adjustment for varying the voltage work fine but all the ones I've come across only go to 4.8V which is about 1/2 power for a laser that needs 6V for full output plus they all seem to be pen type and as we all know the battery capacity isn't very good and thus you can't get a long run time. I did find a few units that go to 6V and are actually VV with display that work and have removable batteries but they are still only 14500 and 16340 although the ProVari 2 is an 18650 but I haven't tested it. It's rather expensive but I believe it will work and has a 16 second lockout which is certainly better than the usual 10.
The one VW unit I have has a 30 second timeout but it has that "without atomizer" issue so won't work with the laser but WILL work for constant on at 6V when switched to "charging" mode which is great but I can't vary the output.
Most of the high powered lasers require 6-9V (or 2 batteries) for full output so you can see why it really would be better if the top setting was actually higher than 6V as that's at the bottom end of what works for full output. From my tests of a specific 462nm laser which is basically a sky blue color the lasing threshold which is just another way of saying the point at which it actually starts to output is about 3.9V. There are other lasers that only need 3-5.5V or a single lithium for full output and they tend to be less powerful. Due to the characteristics of a red diode they will only output at full output and not adjust. I don't know the technical side of it so I'm not the one to ask. Just hoping I'm explaining it right.
I've been into lasers for a couple years now but there's lots of members there that know the real who/what/when/where and why of it all so don't be too surprised if I don't know the answers to your questions.
The laserpointerforum is not really like this forum as most of what I've seen tolerated here wouldn't fly there such as the swearing and ANY kind of illegal or foolish harmful talk. Try to understand that people have done a lot of really stupid things with them like the airplane stuff and we are VERY concerned with our image and don't want to lose the right to build and own them. I'm sure many of you can recall seeing recent news stories about this kind of stuff. IF anyone joins I will give the same advice I give everyone. Be overly nice and try your best to use the BOTTOM search bar first before asking the same questions we hear day after day after day such as what's the best laser to buy and I bought a 10 million watt laser form this Chinese sight and it doesn't seem very powerful and I paid $5 dollars for it do you think I got ripped off....
It's not that we don't care, it's that it gets really old really quick when someone comes in demanding answers and they won't try to look up anything regardless of whether you tell them where to look or not. I'm sure this site deals with it constantly too.
Another thing that is cool about vaping is that it creates "smoke" and guess what makes a laser beam really stand out. In general the most visible wavelength is green such as the most common 532nm seen in those cheap $5 pens sold on Ebay. Understand that almost all of the Ebay pens sold are actually WAY over-spec and should NOT be used for your cat/dog toy. If you can see the beam at all in a dark room it's way too strong. The other issue with green though is they have IR (infrared) component and I've come across a pen that you could barely see but had 10 times the output in IR which is very dangerous especially because you can't see it and thus assume it's not dangerous.
Most of you have no idea that when you buy a cheapo Ebay pen for $5 that is red (650nm) or blue (405nm) which is actually purple unless you spend some $ they are usually 60- 130 mW in output even though you can barely see the beam (or not at all) in a completely dark room and they all say <5mW on them. An example of that power is a focused 50mW unit will light a match. They all come with a little lens in them that is adjusted from the factory to be focused to infinity or in other words a small dot at a long distance from you. Even the units sold as cat toys can be stronger than 5mW as I know this from purchasing and testing.
I'm sure you can figure out where the 510 adapters are being talked about and where they are available. Please don't reference me as the source for any of this as I'm really just here to figure out things and enjoy some juice on the side. It's not like any of you couldn't have stumbled upon them yourselves. It's YOUR responsibility to learn about safety just as it is for anyone vaping. Your fault if you don't heed the warnings.
Thanks for all the help guys
Be safe and have fun
