kirkg (11/16/82)
I'm looking for a laser. Not into one, mind you, but .... Seriously, when I was in high school physics, our teacher set up a great demonstration. He took a cheap speaker, stretched rubber over the front, and glued a chunk of a mirror to it. You focused the laser onto the mirror, then played the stereo, and got laser light, in synch with the music, of course. We borrowed this for an incredible party one time, but that's another story. Anyway, I once wrote to Edmonds Scientific, and found that bargain basement lasers ran around $300. I'd still love to have such a set up of my own, but I don't see many ads for used lasers around. Does anyone know of such a source? I talked to my old physics teacher, and he told me that he had gotten a new laser; his old one had worn out. As I seem to remember, he was told by the manufacturer that he was not using it enough. I breathlessly asked him what he had done with the old one, and he said they gave him $50 trade-in on it. In addition to just getting a laser, I'm also interested in any comments on such a proposed light show. I still haven't figured out how to keep the third speaker from adding low fidelity to the system. Also, how dangerous are simple lasers? Again, reaching into long term memory, I think it was only bad if you just stared right into the thing, and glancing rays weren't a problem. I would appreciate any information, sources, anecdotes, etc. If there is large interest, I will of course post a summary. Thanks, Kirk Glerum ...decvax!microsoft!uw-beaver!kirkg p.s. Can I burn ants with one?