Laser Pens

[Anthony Pearson]

Neil, having had one shone in my eye, I can talk from experience. The light fills the whole of your retina with an 'explosion' of colour. Trust me it's a shock to the system, so it's no surprise that shining a laser at the wildfowl shifts them quickly!

 

[Andy Millichamp]

That'll be those suicide swans, strapped up with explosives and 'steered' by terrorists with laser pens!

It makes you see swans in a different light. I predict that there will be passengers refusing to allow their flight to take off because there is a swan on board, and the police will start installing covert CCTV in areas where swans congregate. I say shoot 'em all!

 

[Neil Smart]

That'll be those suicide swans, strapped up with explosives and 'steered' by terrorists with laser pens!

Finger printed and DNA tested!? There's no hiding now! Unbelievable!

But you should read the last sentence to this bit of Daily Mail 'esque' nonsense, these men were NOT arrested under any terrorism law, just a law protecting aviation. Let's not let the truth get in the way of a good story.

 

[John Glover]

As for those tufty ducks, I havent been able to impersonate those yet, in fear of being humped.....well it is the season!

Any anglers who are in between girlfriends would be glad of any duck that comes along.....

 

[Ian Grant]

Far better would be to 'hiss' at them as they do to us when protecting their young, it works in the dark aswell, and has often stopped other anglers from entering my swim too.

As for those tufty ducks, I havent been able to impersonate those yet, in fear of being humped.....well it is the season!

Hissing at them is all well and good at close range Julian, but at distance it wouldn't work.
Laser pens used responsibly are a pretty good deterrent i think, and far more preferable to a bird getting a hook down it's throat.
Trouble is like two idiots who got swooped on by armed Police near Reading for pointing them at aircraft, there are always those who spoil it for the rest, the pens aren't the problem just some imbeciles who use them.

Ian.

 

[Paul Boote]

"I was only using it to cut an effin' otter in 'alf, yer 'onour, as I'd been told to..."

 

[Mark Anderson]

Hi men,

Works on otters and beavers .


Hatter

 

[Paul Thompson]

All this nonsense about 'laser pens' is the usual uniformed nonsense, usually by the press who would never let the truth get in the way of a good story....

Lasers as used by the military are strictly controlled due to the potential damage they can cause to optics and the mk I eyeball when fired. The light from these lasers is invisible to the human eye (or swans etc). Lasers are used to determine distance to objects by reflection up to a few kilometers in the military which gives you an idea of how powerful they are. We were sometimes suprised at the distances they could measure particularly at night and in poor weather conditions, and sometimes suprised at the lack of a return on seemingly good days -mainly due to the lack of a decent reflective surface)

The 'laser pen' is not in fact a laser, just a concentrated red light source which is very different.

Big difference - look up what the word LASER means.....Wikipedia has a very good page on Lasers.

What is an issue is whether or not a concentrated beam of light which may be 'safe' can cause damage to the optical nerve, some of these light pens are very powerful and having one shone in your eyes even from a long distance will no doubt upset the recipient.....

 

[Andy Millichamp]

All this nonsense about 'laser pens' is the usual uniformed nonsense, usually by the press who would never let the truth get in the way of a good story....

It's an old article, but...
Eye expert challenges laser pen 'danger'

From wikipedia:
"Recent studies show that the risk to the human eye from accidental exposure to light from commercially available class IIIa laser pointers having powers up to 5 mW seems rather small; however, prolonged viewing, such as deliberate staring into the beam for 10 or more seconds, can cause damage"

 

[Mark Anderson]

Hi men ,

" Watch out for that laser pen, you could have someones eye o...................... "

O Bin Ladens last words .


Hatter

 

[Adrian Williams]

Light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation,

The ones you were using Paul were YAG (Yttrium Aluminium Garnet) and operated at 1060nm. I worked on the aircraft mounted version which locked on to the reflections from the ground and then took over with its own beam allowing a bomb to be dropped to within 10 meters of the target.
This was in the early 80's and pretty cutting edge for those days, so cutting edge in fact that my hand written training notes were classed as top secret and locked in a special document store. When you conciser that all the logic circuits were constructed with individual silicon chips it all seems a bit crude now but due to these limitations of the computers at the time they could only refresh 10 times a second which had a direct impact on the accuracy.

I spent two years of my working life dressed like a technician from a Bond film working in a closed clean room doing a modification on the basic laser emitter to double the power output from 2 to 4 watts.
Because the light was outside the visible light spectrum we had to have an eye test every 6 months to check we had not inadvertently zapped ourselves, they were looking for minor blemishes on the retina.
These solid state laser pens (they are actual lasers by the way) have a much lower wavelength, typically 405-840nm which is the visible light spectrum and an output of a few milli watts.
This is a thousand times less than the military ones so to cause any permanent eye damage you would have to shine it in your eye for hours and not move your eye. It would however leave you temporarily blind from the dazzle so don't try it.

In my opinion the only way you could damage a duck with one of these pens is if you loaded it into a blunderbuss and shot it.

 

[Steve Williams]

Light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation,

The ones you were using Paul were YAG (Yttrium Aluminium Garnet) and operated at 1060nm. I worked on the aircraft mounted version which locked on to the reflections from the ground and then took over with its own beam allowing a bomb to be dropped to within 10 meters of the target.
This was in the early 80's and pretty cutting edge for those days, so cutting edge in fact that my hand written training notes were classed as top secret and locked in a special document store. When you conciser that all the logic circuits were constructed with individual silicon chips it all seems a bit crude now but due to these limitations of the computers at the time they could only refresh 10 times a second which had a direct impact on the accuracy.

I spent two years of my working life dressed like a technician from a Bond film working in a closed clean room doing a modification on the basic laser emitter to double the power output from 2 to 4 watts.
Because the light was outside the visible light spectrum we had to have an eye test every 6 months to check we had not inadvertently zapped ourselves, they were looking for minor blemishes on the retina.
These solid state laser pens (they are actual lasers by the way) have a much lower wavelength, typically 405-840nm which is the visible light spectrum and an output of a few milli watts.
This is a thousand times less than the military ones so to cause any permanent eye damage you would have to shine it in your eye for hours and not move your eye. It would however leave you temporarily blind from the dazzle so don't try it.

In my opinion the only way you could damage a duck with one of these pens is if you loaded it into a blunderbuss and shot it.

Made me smile that did Ade......

 

[Paul Thompson]

Andy,

I agree, and my point was that the majority of the time the light pens are purported as having the ability to bring down aircraft, etc etc.

In most cases, having a light pen shone in your eye is no different to looking directly at the sun for a prolonged period - both can cause temporary sight loss due to the optical nerves being unable to cope with the intensity.

Ade,

How very scientific I'll be honest and say I've forgotten most of the theory I learnt, (especially the radar stuff), I'm afraid my brain can't cope with too much info particularly these days with memory loss problems.

It did used to make me chuckle though when on the ranges etc we'd give the warning shout 'Laser Firing', and 'Firing Now' and there would always be some 'rodney' who would look up rather than away......bit like the rule of never look up at an unidentified aircraft as your pale face could give your position away. I always wondered how on earth you could identify it if you didn't...

Crikey, someone pull up a sandbag for me...

Tommo

Mark,It is well known that Bin laden regretted going online to play Call of Duty that night, great special effects though

 

[Adrian Williams]

All the theory was bread and butter to me Paul, my problems used to start with weapons drills. Do I cock it before I start the strip or not? Which way am I supposed to turn that thing when I get a gas stoppage?

 

[Paul Thompson]

 

[Mark de Lancey]

Exactly Dave, better "being mildly frightened by a flash of light" than it is to get 'educated' or 'persuaded' not too steal baits.


Educated - via a catapult.

Persuaded - with a shotgun.

If you do happen to hook up a 'feathered friend' watch out with Moorhens, there claws are damned sharp and foul hooked Coots pull back the hardest, but watch them as they approach the net, as they dart hard for the marginal cover.

couldnt help but laugh at this!