Handheld laser is so powerful it can dazzle astronauts

This ridiculously overpowered handheld laser is on sale for anyone who wants to pay for it, I admit it is an incredible bit of kit, but should it be allowed to be sold so carelessly? It has the potential to cause major accidents or blind people.

Lasers are all around us - in every CD and DVD player on Earth - but most are weedy little beams very far removed from science fiction's visions of terrible space weaponry. Wicked Laser's Spider 3 Krypton is another matter. It has a range of 85 miles, can set fire to paper from across a room, and is capable of pinpointing objects outside Earth's atmosphere

The cool lightsabre like design of the laser itself looks like it is marketed towards teenagers.

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Link to the full story is broke, you can find it on this page though.www.dailymail.co.uk...

reply to post by Atzil321


Same story as last year, when they released the arctic spyder 3 at 1 W.
This one is the same strength, but green instead of blue.
Let´s hope it will not spark such a hoopla as last year, since so far no incidents with the arctic have been reported.

I wonder if that can be used as a Green Dot Finder on my guided equitorial mounted refractor telescope


hehe

reply to post by NeoVain


I was unaware such powerful lasers were available to the public before reading that story in the mail this morning. surely such things belong in the science lab or industrial processes. What possible use could they have to the genaral public? I can't think of anything other than flashing planes, vehicles or some poor sods retinas.

Woah, i want one Perfect when TSHTF, just point and boom, people are on fire. But in all seriousness, this is quite a dangerous tool for the general public.

Can it burn the pants of an asstronaut?

I am waiting for the first hack to incrase the power.

Can a refractor with 5x barlow increase the range?

reply to post by Anonymouth


Someone could always try

What would happen if someone were to buy like 50 or so and tape them together and point them at someone

Could be a way of getting people away from TV

Disable the TV satellites, very easy to do, just stick it on a GEM mount and track it, since its geostationary it will be pretty easy to track it.

Expand that to people all over the contenent and it will be one powerful blinding spot.

I am actually supprised the UK is not banning them under terror laws lol

It could be used for terrorism at an airport.

dont bother.

wicked lasers is the biggest failure of a company ever.

last year with the release of the "Arctic" (blue version) id say maybe 1 out of ten people actually got their laser. others got an empty box with Green "US CUSTOMS" tape across it, and a seizure notice. or nothing at all.

and many of them had to wait damn near a year to get it.

go check there forum, theres people who still havent even gotten the blue one. even with their heavy censoring over a year later theres still people constantly complaining that they cant get ahold of anybody via phone or email.

they just take your money and you never hear from them again. you can call them and email them all day long and they just ignore you or have a bot talk to you on their "live help chat" (rofl)

last year, they marketed the blue one on there site as "in stock". and after the huge influx of orders, they went ahead and bought a new building and aquired another company BEFORE THEY EVEN HAD THE THINGS MADE. then they gave us the run around for 6 months pretending to be "remodeling it to have more features" which turned out to be moving the on button up to the middle and giving it a "pulse" option. turned out to be useless. once they had their new building and employees and profits they just decided they didnt need to honor the orderes already on the books. even started banning people for asking questions in the forum. of course by then the credit card companies wouldnt issue a chargeback and everybody got screwed out of their $$. except for about 5000 who got the first wave of the G1 model, and even then many had manufacturing issues.

if you really want one there are other laser companies that sell the same thing, just be careful trying to import them if your country doesnt allow lasers over 5mW. www.o-like.com

for clarification: in the US anything over 5mW cannot be marketed as a "laser pointer" but can be a "handheld laser".

the reason this model can be seen at much further distances is because the human eye render's green as a much more visable wavelength compared to other colors.

if you absolutely have to have the lightsaber looking model, id wait until they start popping up on ebay. plenty of people were disappointed with the "arctic" last year and ended up selling them for a fraction of what they paid.

im still not quite buying into the "seen from space" hype.... plenty of people have 1W+ green lab laser modules and point them at the sky, and ive never heard of any astronauts being "dazzeled" from space....

the diode in these is no different, its just handheld and powered via lithium battery....

if you really want to get into lasers do it like the enthusiests and build your own. many people sell "kits". a laser is an incredibly simple device to make, and youll learn a thing or 2 in the process...

www.laserpointerforums.com - great resource for building handheld lasers

could be quite good depending on battery life as something to start a fire when theres only damp material to hand

reply to post by Maxatoria


you can but it would be overkill. green is the best wavelegnth for visibility but not for burning.

same can be accomplished with a magnifying glass+sunlight, or a much much lower powered(and therefore cheaper) red/blue/violet laser.

many laser's have a focusing lens built into it, that narrow the beam into a smaller more concentrated area.

reply to post by RelentlessLurker
Thats all very informative, but does not take into account how dangerous these things can be
in the wrong hands, and with no checks and a policy that seemingly anyone can aquire one, you can be sure they will fall into the wrong hands. I have no problem with responsible enthusiasts like yourself, but the idea of these things in the hands of irresponsible teens is just ridiculous.

reply to post by Atzil321


a year ago i would have argued with you.

but after owning one for awhile. im actual going to agree with you... they can be dangerous. dangerous to the point where if an intruder came into my house, i would probably go for the laser before my gun (depending on which is closer..)


my only argument at this point in time is that regulating them would be incredibly hard to do, as the main part to the laser (diode) is in far too many consumer products. and as i said in my other post, they are incredibly easy to put together into a handheld device, such as the one being marketed.

HD projectors can have dozens of diodes of this strength, and dvd/blueray burners can have diodes of about half.

all are dangerous.

but with this green one...a lot more things are possible...i dont want to give anybody any bad ideas but could you imagine some kind of situation involving emergency vehicles and some dumb kid 10 miles away harassing the entire scene? this one puts the weilder so far out of range that it can be difficult or even impossible to find let alone respond to.

dont get me started on the planes.

i hate this damn company.

This thing has been out for a while. Lucasfilms filed a trademark lawsuit against them claiming it was a lightsaber ripoff.

reply to post by mantic


that was a different model.

this one isnt even made yet. only a few people received promotional demos of this one.

this one is 20 times more visible than the one lucas try'd to sue over (and failed)

Originally posted by RelentlessLurker
could you imagine some kind of situation involving emergency vehicles and some dumb kid 10 miles away harassing the entire scene?

Nope.

The bigger worry would be where he acquired the means to stabilize that laser.

The cool lightsabre like design of the laser itself looks like it is marketed towards teenagers.

Haha, like teenagers these days know what a lightsaber is

I think I know what my next investment is... Call me crazy, but I bet you could get the point across to some ET vehicles that may be above. And yes by which I mean possibly get picked up. Hitchiking with a laser, why not. Be better than being here as long as they don't core your anus out or molest you.

I guess now they can do emergency c-sections on someone in outer space now?
That's a joke. Lasers are used for c-secections, yes you can smell your flesh burning open.
It happens very fast too.