Lately I've been trying to meter all the notable lasers in my collection. Mostly I've been ok with the findings(some have been a little underspec, some right on spec and some overspec.). However, I just metered my old optotronics RPL-300 and I'm honestly shocked. This is my oldest remaining laser except for a laserglow lyra. I think I got it back in 2008 actually and it came with a power cert stating the output to be 308mw peak.
The graph speaks for itself. The laser seems to have dropped significantly in power. It still works fine overall with no mode hopping and good beam specs, but the output has fallen off a cliff. Test was done with a fresh AW 18650 and I redid it 3-4 times to make sure it wasn't just a mistake. I then went and remeasured some of my known lasers and they all seem normal.
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The graph speaks for itself. The laser seems to have dropped significantly in power. It still works fine overall with no mode hopping and good beam specs, but the output has fallen off a cliff. Test was done with a fresh AW 18650 and I redid it 3-4 times to make sure it wasn't just a mistake. I then went and remeasured some of my known lasers and they all seem normal.
