Reports until 15:36, Wednesday 31 May 2017
H1 ISC (ISC)
peter.king@LIGO.ORG - posted 15:36, Wednesday 31 May 2017 (36574)
ALS EndX laser biopsy
Performed a quick check of the ALS laser that was removed from EndX yesterday, InnoLight Prometheus S/N 2011B.
The datasheet for this laser is here.  The following settings
were as I found the laser:
  diode current                    1.832 A
  laser crystal temperature        29.02 degC
  doubling crystal temperature     33.41 degC
  diode 1 temperature              20.99 degC
  diode 2 temperature              20.30 degC
The output power at 532 nm was 47.4 mW as measured by a Thorlabs S140C power meter. The output power at 1064 nm was 1.53 W as measured by a Gentec TPM300 power meter. Initially the power at 532 nm seemed reasonably stable. Then I observed it climb from 47.4 mW to ~60 mW and back down a couple of times. During these episodes the 1064 nm power remained stable. The frequency doubling crystal TEC error signal varied from 1 mV to 2.2 mV. Which corresponds to a temperature change of 1.2 mV / (10 V/degC) = 0.12E-3 degC. The change in wavelength with respect to temperature is ~0.03 nm/degC. However just because the wavelength changes doesn't necessarily mean the output power changes, that depends on the resonator finesse. I then set the laser settings to those listed in the datasheet, namely
  diode current                     1.750 A
  laser crystal temperature         24.00 degC
  doubling crystal temperature      33.20 degC
  diode 1 temperature               20.99 degC
  diode 2 temperature               20.31 degC
At these settings the output power at 1064 nm was 1.44 W. Initially the output power at 532 nm was 41.4 mW but was seen to vary as high as ~63 mW. Again no temperature or diode power related signals appeared to vary in sync with the observed power changes. Perhaps of note is the thermistor reference voltage(s) were measured to be 6.64 V and 6.58 V, instead of 6.85 V for both the frequency doubling crystal and diode 2 respectively. Without knowing the circuitry for the thermistor, I don't know if this is significant or not.