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How I got my laser eye injury

funraniumlabs.com

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Re: How I got my laser eye injury

#171

Post by convolvatron »

abakker wrote: post #153
convolvatron wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I tig. wear a helmet and have to buy argon every year. this seems like a huge hassle in comparison. is there that big a difference in quality and or range of processes that make it worth it?

its the operator skill part when dealing with thin sheet metal. It just works better / easier / faster for thin stuff, where in TIG, that's the high-skill work that everyone pays big bucks for. Agree with the post above, though. The safety setup for lasers is basically full isolation.

seems like its more cost effective to just stay on or above 20ga unless you're really high volume or you really need the weight savings

Re: How I got my laser eye injury

#172

Post by leoqa »

wildzzz wrote: post #126
dghughes wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At a casino where I was a slot tech we used fiber optics that went into a fiber converter module and then RJ-45. Often I would look at the ends of the fiber connectors to see if they were lit or if the light looked odd. They were quite low in power but I'm surprised at myself that I didn't think of the risk. edit: optics not options

Patch fiber is usually using Class 1 or Class 1M lasers which are entirely safe to look at. Also the light spreads out very rapidly at the end of an unterminated fiber because there's no lens to focus it. So don't hold it directly up against your eye but like a foot away is fine. The lasers are less focused (i.e. cheaper) and the multi-mode fiber is wide so it spreads out very quickly. You can't actually see the IR l…

As an intern moving data centers the old networking guy told me to look into them; I used my right eye and now my eye is 20/40 a decade later whereas my left eye is still 20/20. I did hold it up to my eye because it was hard to see..

Re: How I got my laser eye injury

#173

Post by meindnoch »

cowthulhu wrote: post #164
notelectronic wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get laser safety curtains, but what do you do for reflections off the ceiling? Asking because our makerspace was recently donated a fiber laser welding unit and we don’t yet know best practices for not blinding our membership short of building a completely enclosed separate room for it with door interlocks.

Are lasers typically able to reflect off of surfaces that diffuse light (ie drywall)? I’m totally ignorant when it comes to laser safety, apologies if this is a stupid question .

Do you see a bright spot when aiming the laser at drywall? If the answer is yes, then laser light is being reflected into your eye.

Hope this helps!

Re: How I got my laser eye injury

#174

Post by [deleted] »

DannyBee wrote: post #17

So I laser weld, and beyond my own PPE, interlocks (gun won't fire if it's not touching metal, etc), the most important part of the whole setup is laser safety curtains. Because it's a 2500 watt laser, if i didn't have laser safety curtains , the relections/etc could very easily blind someone at a fairly long distance. The NOHD (nominal ocular hazard distance) is something like 10km (2500 watt laser, 0.06mm spot size…

[deleted]

Re: How I got my laser eye injury

#175

Post by madjam002 »

dmd wrote: post #28

I'm not entirely sure, but I suspect my Hole In My Eye[0] came from being 30 years old (I'm 46 now) and saying "look, this laser pointer is so low power, I can shine it in my eye to no ill effect!". [0] https://dmd.3e.org/a-hole-in-my-eye/

One of the things I hate most in tourist hotspots these days are the people selling high powered laser pointers, normally selling them to kids, and they are shining it at their faces, in the faces of others, and at the neighbours.

I swear they never used to be so commonplace.

Having worked nightclub lighting a long time ago I have a deep appreciation for laser safety haha

Re: How I got my laser eye injury

#176

Post by dietr1ch »

altruios wrote: post #115
jnwatson wrote: post #73

Rule number 1 of laser safety is "do not look into beam with remaining eye".

I think that's rule number two. Right after "don't look at the laser".

then the third rule must be, "now you can do whatever the fuck you want" written in Braille.

Re: How I got my laser eye injury

#177

Post by tomcam »

> the company claims the machine can take care of business safely "even in the most movement-heavy conditions," and that dry run testing on moving humans has all been successful.

So many questions

Re: How I got my laser eye injury

#178

Post by anonymousiam »

NotYourLawyer wrote: post #163
dmd wrote: post #28

I'm not entirely sure, but I suspect my Hole In My Eye[0] came from being 30 years old (I'm 46 now) and saying "look, this laser pointer is so low power, I can shine it in my eye to no ill effect!". [0] https://dmd.3e.org/a-hole-in-my-eye/

“Low power” lasers are sometimes wildly more powerful than they claim to be. I guess what do you expect when you buy a Chinese laser pointer on Amazon for 5 bucks.

Nd:YAG lasers such as the one in the article use an IR exciter into a crystal to achieve frequency doubling or tripling. Much of the energy from the fundamental exciter makes it past the crystal, so without good filtering, a "safe" class 2 or 3R laser can still produce blinding (but invisible) light. Lots of the cheap lasers don't have good filtering, so be careful what you buy.

Re: How I got my laser eye injury

#179

Post by kqr »

N_A_T_E wrote: post #109

I worked in a laser lab for a few months early in my career. After the safety training I fear lasers getting near my eyes in situations most people don't care about. I even look away from barcode scanners at grocery stores. Sometimes I wonder about lidar being shot in all directions from those self-driving cars around SF.

Wait, are barcode scanners lasers? I've always thought of them as red lamps because their cone spreads out so widely quickly.

Re: How I got my laser eye injury

#180

Post by rtkwe »

RandomThoughts3 wrote: post #168
dctoedt wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> hull damage being caused or not caused by a rifle being fired from the flight deck of a ship How did that happen? Our MarDet would occasionally do live-fire training off the flight deck (CVN-65); they naturally pointed their weapons away from the ship .... Or are you talking about hitting the hull of a different ship, e.g., one of the tin cans in plane guard, or alongside during an UNREP? Seems like that would ...…

Hypothetically, someone could have left a guest (like say an engineer from the shipyard doing sea acceptance testing) fire a rifle and an unlucky wave reflection might have bounced a round back towards the bow.

Wow what an incredibly unfortunate hypothetical situation. 1 in a million ricochet that one.
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