Instructions for Making a Star Trek Phaser

If you'Re curious about the nuts and bolts behind the phaser mental synthesis from this week's installment of The Escapist Display, you've refer the right place. Here you'll find a list of all the materials you'll need for the labor, as well as step-by-step instructions. Delight remember to follow all obligatory safety precautions and Don't economic consumption your phaser to rob a bank, or anything.

Let's start with a list of the items you'll need.

Supplies

• Star Trek toy phaser (World Wide Web.thinkgeek.com)
• Laser diode module (www.laserdiy.com)
• Laser driver lap (web.laserdiy.com)
• 4Ω(Georg Simon Ohm) resistor (www.laserdiy.com, www.digikey.com)
• Uninominal channel optoisolator (World Wide Web.sparkfun.com , WWW.digikey.com)
• 3v coin cubicle battery w/ holder (Radio Shack #2032)
• Cable
• Solder

Tools:

• Dremel
• Soldering iron out with temperature control
• Multimeter
• Screwdrivers
• Electrify strippers/cutters
• Sturdy razor OR utility knife
• Non-conductive glue (cyanoacrylate recommended)

Safety Equipment:

• Safety glasses, for usage with mightiness tools
• Safety goggles, for utilisation with lasers (must freeze the specific frequency of your laser, and should cover your peripheral sight, too)
  (Federal Reserve note: I used welding goggles with a special plate. They go both as safety glasses, and precise effective optical maser aegis.)

Now that you've got the equipment you'll need, let's affect on to the effective structure.

First Step: Deconstruction

The toy phaser is built to be really tough, and it can be a challenge to take apart. The type 1 phaser is clastic, so take IT murder before using whatsoever tools.

Start at the front last, where the "focusing ring" is. There's a man holding it in that you'll have to bust. Using a razor blade or utility knife, carefully score the part along the seam. Role a thin screwdriver or other small tool to break it into two pieces. Remove it along with the "focalisation ring."

The bottom portion of the handgrip and rear detail piece are held in situ by friction – gently rock them back and forward to take out. There are three small Phillips head screws holding the phaser together, that can be hard to pull out without a thin screwdriver. With the screws remote, gently separate the two halves of the phaser.

Watch for springs and teeny-weeny parts, and take note of the mechanical portion of the phaser's viscera. Remove all the mechanical parts, soh they won't be well lost. Desolder and remove the red LED that comes with the toy – make something else with it.

Step 2: Electronics

You whitethorn deliver detected two leap out-loaded prongs that associate the type 1 phaser to the type 2. Use the multimeter to shape out the polarity of these prongs. Ne'er corporate trust cable color – red isn't ever positive, and black isn't always negative. Connect these to the input side of the optoisolator, according to the wiring plot.

For a bigger version of the diagram, click here.

Warning: Ascribable the potential dangers of lasers at whatever power range, IT is your responsibility to follow all regulations and safeguards required by your local, state, and national government. You assume sperm-filled responsibility for any face melting or acts of foolishness involving lasers.

The laser module is a delicate device. I constructed mine from its constituent parts, and managed to screw up the lense. Get IT pre-built by someone who deals with lasers every daylight. Link the confident lead to a 4Ω resistor. This protects the laser rectifying valve, and then you should never bypass it. Laser diodes get into't work the same agency LEDs do – you can't just hook it up to a battery and carry it to work for very long, if at all. This is wherefore you need a optical maser driver; it takes the power from your battery and makes it available to the laser diode in your module.

Since you have an inline resistor, information technology is safe to get around the potentiometer on the circuit card. Connect the disinclined lead story directly to the switch, and the undeniable lead to the diggings on the other side of the driver circuit board.

Put on your laser-safe glasses, and hook aweigh a 3v source to the driver racing circuit (the spring is negative.) You derriere use the button on the device driver board to test your laser module. Exist careful – it's just a quick test of your circuit!

When you'ray sure the laser circuit is functioning, it's time to connect it to the output of the optoisolator.

Connect the chip to the contacts happening the switch – the side next to the spring is unfavorable. Finally, connect the coin cadre battery to the power device driver, remembering that the spring is pessimistic.

Measure 3: Making Everything Fit (aka The Catchy Part)

Thither isn't a slew of room at heart the phaser. Since all the mechanical parts still have to work, IT's going to be a tight fit. Start with the laser module – use a dremel with a grinder to make a tooth decay.

The piston chamber shape is pretty more the exact size up of the laser module, and makes excitable calculate of plastic. Clean up the edges, and make dependable the faculty fits. Glue it in place on one half of the phaser.

While you have the glue exterior, start gluing down pat the mess of wires, and the battery holder.

Wee-wee sure you don't have any short circuits along the way. You nates glue down the laser number one wood tour if you like, but I won't recommend it. It's more than easier to slay and replace if something breaks, and the driver is a good spot to commence troubleshooting. Once everything is in place, supersede all the mechanical parts.

There's a couple of springs that can bewilder frustrating – just be long-suffering, and it will all close. One time the deuce halves of the phaser toy are back unitedly, replace the screws, and reattach the type 1 phaser. You now take a working (hopefully important) phaser!

If you like things jolly, or in some way preoccupied the thrill of burning things with light, you crapper glue the broken piece from Step 1 and put back it. Just recollect that in one case you do that, you'll suffer to break it again when it comes time to change the stamp battery.

Voila! Your same own outer space peacemaker.

https://www.escapistmagazine.com/instructions-for-making-a-star-trek-phaser/

Source: https://www.escapistmagazine.com/instructions-for-making-a-star-trek-phaser/

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