An RFI Source Found

Good thing the gummint division that takes care of LASERs is not so vigorous. Due maybe to FAA complaints and run of the mill evildoers, they are, however, banning imports of some lasers, broadly speaking mostly those that:

emit more than a certain amount of power and do not have the proper safety devices integrated
-or-
emit more than a certain amount of power and are not OEM devices designed to be integrated into a system.

Both need to be licensed in the state of TX though. $350 each laser.. There is a loop hole. If the power can be controlled by a setting to some lower amount, I forget hwat, no license is needed unless the device is operated above the limit.

So for now, anything that looks like a >5mW pointer or "mega pointer" is being forbidden. Barebones parts and assemblies are not. I just ordered two 100mW red laser OEM assy. Yet a deviation in the enforcement is that the green one that seems exactly the same OEM type and form factor is forbidden.

I need the red lasers to align the optics on a YAG laser project. Red will pass through.. green generally does not. Nonetheless, why the clampdown on the green lasers? same box. what gives?

Someone is always out to spoil the experimenters' efforts.

(AM content- -these can be amplitude modulated and operate on 461 or 565 THz, respectively. Yag as an aside is pulsed operation at 282 THz. )

Thank goodness there are no LASER Police. Yet. An eventual goal is the retroreflector on old Luna. Not hard getting the pulse there. Hard is listening (looking?) for the return buried in the noise. others have done it and it is generally not as easy as with radio waves. So alot of people don't try it. besides it has little practical use except to impress girls.