Splatter?

All right. Had my new leadlight for a day and have a few questions. I have seen the term "SPLATTER" used here on the forum. What is it? What does it look like? And is it correctable? I am VERY HAPPY with this leadlight 105. Thanks

Tim

If it's talking about a Leadlight, then I'm sure it refers to the light visible around the green dot. Eg, put your hand close to the laser beam but not touching the dot. Your hand is being illuminated by splatter.

High end lasers will not cast this useless light, producing a perfect beam only.

Will disassembly and re-focusing the lenses reduce this?

Tim

Cleaning the lens will almost completly remove this provided you haven't disassembled your laser before and gotten dirt inside...

How do I clean the lens?

I guess the light I am seeing may be just reflected light from the main beam. When I rotate the laser on it's longitudinal axis, the reflection follows the rotation. This light is most noticable on a wall with the beam not on, but next to the edge of the wall (like the beam going through a doorway). This is when you can see the "reflected" light the best. Any thoughts.

Tim

Ok. I decided to clean the lens with a twisted piece of tissue dampened with a smidge of rubbing alcohol. Stuck it in the emitter hole and gave a couple of twists and BAMM!! No more splatter. THe beam is so bright now that you can't look at it on a white wall for more than a sec or two. And I do not see the "splatter" like I did before. Thanks for the info.

Tim

And to keep it clean, you can put a piece of tape on the head when you don't use it...

Ok. I got home and decided to remove the apperature cap to be able to get to the lens. I checked the lens using a jewelers loupe (10X mag) and the lens looked like someone had used "Armor All" to clean it. It was very "smudgy" and oily looking. I used a littel alcohol and a Q-tip and was able to get it "Operating Room" clean. Zero dust and specks of whatever. Put it back together and it now has no observable splatter at all. I was glad to see that Leadlight uses glass lenses and not plastic for their collimating lenses. Works even better now. Nice tight beam and almost zero splatter. Thanks again.

Tim

I thought it was called "scatter" or "speckle"? Never heard the term "splatter" used to describe a laser before.

scatter, splatter, speckle...all I know is my leadlight no longer has it. I do like the term "speckle" better. It does describe it better. I am new to this and am learning. Be gentle with me.

Tim

I thought all lasers had some sidescatter due to interference effects?

and I thought splatter was the result of too much... uhh... never mind.

*backs away slowly...*

/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif yeah, thats what i was thinking too.......LOL

I suppose we can define it into 2 groups of "Splatter"

Dirt on the lense of a laser pointer will cause splatter. Fine particles or a fine filament like hair can cause "splatter" or a star like pattern.

If you (keeping the unit OFF) blow on the lense of a green pointer one or more times you will see a very interesting "splatter" than slowly goes away as the vapor from your breath drys.

I can't believe no one has spit (not seriously) into the end of a laser yet.... /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

And if you do see the pattern from breath does it look like something that you could use in a laser show? How would you implement it?