mackem

Hi All,

The laser diode arrived today. It's gonna be used as a target designator in my Leo.
Can't believe how small it is, 12mm long, 4mm wide.

Cheers
John

Planedev

That looks nice, where did you get it?

mackem

Typed 'Laser Diode' into ebay and bought the cheapest one that came up.
Can't wait to get it fitted in the leo and give it a run out!

John

brel

nice what is the voltage of the diode

mackem

Hi Brel,

It works on 3 volts, so it should be fine wired in place of the machine gun led.

Cheers
John

heavyaslead

Would be interested to see how it works, may liken unto a tracer type effect.

Looks like a laser pointer type diode, don't look directly into it!

ostketten

Yes, it is very much like a stream of red tracers, especially in lower light conditions. Use the same cautions you would use for any laser, don't point it at eyes... yours, your pets, whatever, a little common sense is all that is needed here, and considering that it will be firing down very low to the ground most of the time anyawy, this really shouldn't be much of an issue. I have one installed in the hull MG position on my WSN T-34 and it works great, the effect is very satisfying, it pulses in synch with and at exactly the same rate as the MG firing sound, awesome. I have it set to "impact" the ground at about 100 (scale) meters in front of the tank. These are quite easy to install in the hull MG position on most tanks, but more difficult in turrets. I would like to emphasize that I installed mine to replicate a bow Machine Gun firing tracer bullets, not as a "targeting laser" which would be fine for a modern tank like a Leo or Abrams but unrealistic for a WWII tank.

Planedev

I could not find this particular item in evil bay but no worries, I found some cheap green laser pointers instead and wonder if that will be cooler in my tank as I alreay have a red laser pointer in it.

heard that the green lasers have visible beams eevn in day light. Though I know it would be a bad idea to let the enemy know I am pointing at them during battles.

Ern

Planedev, before you order, check what voltage the green laser requires. If you're doing a simple swap with the machine gun LED you only have about 2.4v going to it. A lot of the green ones I saw when I was ordering required more voltage. The ones I got on eBay were rated at 3v and the seller warned against using any more on them [but as I said HL electronics already reduce the voltage going to the LED]

ostketten

Should still work though Ern, but possibly it's output would be somewhat reduced...?? I dunno, I'm no electro geek, overdriving will burn it out for sure, but under volting it probably wouldn't be that much of an issue..?? As for the green, it might actually be more realistic, at least on a german tank, I think the huns used green and/or blue tracers on their MG bullets didn't they..??

Alan123

Can you please post a link to the ebay item so that I can find one too for my leo2.

What a great mod idea.

Thanks

Alan.

Ern

Here's the one I used. It's an easy swap, fits in the Tiger mantlet, and the 2.4v powers it very nicely. It gives a nice pulsing red laser with machine gun sound when you push the G button on the HL transmitter.

http://cgi.ebay.com/Laser-Diode-Modu...1%7C240%3A1318

Planedev

Thanks for teh advice, but I usually power the laser with a seperate AAA batt pack that is turned on via a pico switch slaved to the landing gear channel. So that should not be a problem. The only issue i have is finding a green laser module small enuff. Those on evil bay seem to be huge in comparison. Either that or I should keep the large module for something with a bigger turrent than a pershing.