You’ll shoot your eye out…with a 1MW laser pulse pistol

posted Mar 10th 2011 5:12am by
filed under: laser hacks

laser_pulse_gun

G.I. Joe used them to battle Cobra’s evil forces. Han solo shot his first in the Mos Eisley Cantina. For years, hand-held pulse laser guns have been something that existed only in the realm of cartoons and movies…until now.

German hacker [Patrick Priebe] recently constructed a laser pulse gun that looks so good, it could have easily come off a Hollywood movie set. Its sleek white and black exterior adds intrigue, but offers little warning as to how powerful the gun actually is.

Fitted with a Q-switched Nd:YAG laser, it fires off a 1 MW blast of infrared light once the capacitors have fully charged. The duration of the laser pulse is somewhere near 100ns, so he was unable to catch it on camera, but its effects are easily visible in whatever medium he has fired upon. The laser can burst balloons, shoot through plastic, and even blow a hole right through a razor blade.

[Patrick] says that he is more than happy to help out anyone looking to source parts and build one for their own use, so what are you waiting for?

Stick around for a quick demo video of the gun in action.

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127 Responses to You’ll shoot your eye out…with a 1MW laser pulse pistol

  • LaserLance says:
    March 11, 2011 at 10:20 am

    @Jeditalian – The laser doesn’t emit any sort of gas or shockwave, per say; however, once the pulse of energy hits a material and the photons react with that material, there tends to be a small ‘pop’–a small explosion that we in the business call “ablation”. If this laser had the ability to emit a pulse train then it would actually be able to translate the frequency at which the q-switch is functioning. In one of our demo lasers, we have programmed a laser to “sing” the Star Spangled Banner by varying the frequency, duty-cycle, duration and current.

    @CrunchySteve – I would put my hand in front of this laser and shoot it. I want to just to show you how ludicrous your statements are. A weapon, this is not.

    @The Beast – This is a nano-second laser, not a pico-second laser. Big difference. You’re funny though.

    @cknopp – Cordless drill retrofit: best idea yet! haha

    Reply Report comment
  • Jeditalian says:
    March 12, 2011 at 8:12 pm

    it’s like the BB-gun version of Halo weapons. Awesome for proving the possibility of it. Bring on the 1.21 GigaWatt model!

    Reply Report comment
  • Ryan Mercer says:
    March 12, 2011 at 11:41 pm

    I call BS

    Reply Report comment
  • Selestar says:
    March 13, 2011 at 2:06 pm

    It is very difficult to measure this kind of pulsed laser obtained with YAG rod and cavity. Presumably the power of this kind of laser is between 10 and 100 kW

    Reply Report comment
  • Eric says:
    March 13, 2011 at 8:11 pm

    I emailed this guy asking for directions. He said he doesn’t have any.

    I emailed him again asking for a parts list or where he got the main components. This is his reply.

    —-
    No………diode…..

    Cant make a list. You wont get all parts anyways. They are expensive and hard to get.

    Du kannst auf diese Nachricht antworten, indem du zu deinem Posteingang gehst.
    —–

    Reply Report comment
  • Garrett says:
    March 18, 2011 at 6:50 am

    That all well and good but will it blend?

    Reply Report comment
  • golddigger says:
    March 18, 2011 at 6:56 am

    1.21 Gigawatts!!!!

    Reply Report comment
  • Cylon says:
    March 18, 2011 at 7:01 pm

    Germany, so it will stay like this and never enter serial production. Not even as something to base other systems upon.

    Nice toy. But if I shoot you with a Glock you’re still dead. Propelled projectiles have been working for hundreds of years. Perfectly at that. They are cheap and easy to maintain. What if you run out of batteries with this? Then it’s a very… Hmmm… plastic club. I rather run out of ammo on an AK47, it makes a better club.

    Reply Report comment
  • Lord Boofhead says:
    March 21, 2011 at 2:46 am

    Nice.

    Just a shame it looks like an iPod, needs more chrome…

    Reply Report comment
  • 23 says:
    March 22, 2011 at 11:46 am

    @golddigger:
    1.21 jigga-whats??

    Reply Report comment
  • bud says:
    March 22, 2011 at 1:07 pm

    Do not look into laser with remaining good eye!

    Reply Report comment
  • Joe says:
    March 31, 2011 at 1:56 pm

    don’t laze me bro!

    Reply Report comment
  • ElectroNick says:
    April 1, 2011 at 3:53 pm

    Despite all the dangers of high power laser, this would be a great thing to have in case of a home invasion. Won’t cause ablation :) for sure but is safer for the homeowner than a handgun. A blind robber is not a very good (at least not the most efficient) robber.

    I think your home valuables would be safer if robbers would expect everyone to confront them with a 1W+ laser (borrowing from the NRA line of reasoning). And it would be funny to see results of robbery done in OD4+ safety glasses, at night!

    Reply Report comment
  • RegalSin says:
    April 11, 2011 at 7:28 pm

    An invisible laser has killed people before, more notibly a certain figure. There is also the laser demonstration in LA, by the governator himself. Small off the shelf pointy lasers also can affect people, from far distances. The military has a beam that can transfer heat directed at a person to force them out of hiding, that is a dangerous laser right there. Pretty cool considering the time the guy has.

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  • Greg says:
    April 19, 2011 at 9:06 pm

    Build ten of these, and find a way to fire it sixty times a second at a moving projectile. You will be very close to sending very small objects into orbit by creating a plume of plasma under the object.

    Reply Report comment
  • Jacob says:
    June 23, 2011 at 5:39 pm

    Now we just need a rifle version.

    Reply Report comment
  • Julie says:
    June 27, 2011 at 5:13 pm

    Thats a pretty cool toy

    Reply Report comment
  • Austin says:
    October 31, 2011 at 8:22 am

    Seriously, an FYI for those of you who said that the pulse isn’t seen because it is in infrared, most if not all cameras, regardless of if they use tapes or sd cards, regardless of most types of sensors, still record infrared light. This light is TRANSLATED to the visible spectrum by the recording process and compiling of video. It is recorded digitally, and is displayed in the visible light spectrum when played back on a video screen. So, the pulse was really to short for it to be captured by the camera recording at 29.97 FPS.

    Reply Report comment
  • Fernando Lopez Jr. says:
    December 31, 2011 at 4:29 pm

    it would be fun if you upgrade the gun with those water lenses =)

    Reply Report comment
  • War_Spigot says:
    December 31, 2011 at 11:51 pm

    Possibly, some sort of rotating system could be used(as in a revolver, or a cylindrical magazine) that has precharged capacitors in it, thus eliminating the battery, reducing the time between shots, and, in my opinion, making it seem more awesome.

    Reply Report comment
  • Matz05 says:
    January 7, 2012 at 4:56 pm

    Nice build! Yeah, its dangerous, but not much more than a gun firing (easily ricocheting) steel BBs at high velocities…

    Best not use it near others, though. Beam goggles are mandatory!

    Reply Report comment
  • Matz05 says:
    January 13, 2012 at 4:20 pm

    Idiots won’t be able to afford something like this.
    Unlike double-barreled shotguns, laser pistols aren’t a dime a dozen.

    Less dangerous too.

    Someone who has that kind of money has much cheaper, more effective ways of being an idiot. This is not a big deal.

    Reply Report comment
  • dumbass says:
    March 27, 2012 at 2:54 pm

    It looks like the “Deux Ex: Human Revolution” stun gun.

    Reply Report comment
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