Thinking of building my own laser: For better reasons than the last guy

[Aepoc]

Hey everyone,

I have been building flashlights for a while now and I would just like to do something a little different. I have had a couple of 30mw green lasers from dx and have been very impressed except for when the switches crapped out on me. I would like to build a reliable toy (no greater than 200mw)

I have looked at a couple of uv lasers (within the visible spectrum) that nichea offers... other than a diode, a host and batteries, I don't know what i need to make this happen.

Please, any tips or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Has anybody used a particular host with great success in the past? What else do I need? How can I make this more reliable than a typical DX laser? Should I worry about being able to focus the laser or should i make it fixed? ...

 

[Boston_George]

A better reason than the last guy? Whats that mean??? You can always build one to point across the sky!

 

[Kiessling]

Derogatory title and silly follow-up post just ended this thread.
Feel free to post another one on this topic though.
bernhard