Love, love, love this high-speed stuff! It's been something I've wanted to dabble in but have not had time. What I really want to do is buy one of these and cobble up some sensors. But I also have to pt together a high-speed (short duration) flash.
Love, love, love this high-speed stuff! It's been something I've wanted to dabble in but have not had time. What I really want to do is buy one of these and cobble up some sensors. But I also have to pt together a high-speed (short duration) flash.
You can buy these, but the duration is still 9 microseconds. For sub microsecond flash durations, you really can't use a xenon tube.
You can also get a 0.5 microsecond flash from these folks. This is basically an updated version of Edgerton's original EG&G 549. You can find the plans for the EG&G 549 online (they were published in Scientific American back in the '70s. I'd be scared to homebrew anything like that unless I was 115% sure of what I was doing. There's an awful lot of energy being discharged in a very short time.
I used one of the Prism Science units during my High Speed Imaging class at MIT.
Love, love, love this high-speed stuff! It's been something I've wanted to dabble in but have not had time. What I really want to do is buy one of these and cobble up some sensors. But I also have to pt together a high-speed (short duration) flash.
You can buy these, but the duration is still 9 microseconds. For sub microsecond flash durations, you really can't use a xenon tube.
Yep, that seals it, you are pure evil!
True, xenon has its (severe) limits. If I ever get brave enough, I'd like to build an air-discharge flash. Buying one looks *very* expensive. I'm even afraid to ask what the Prism Science SPOT flash costs :-P
Love, love, love this high-speed stuff! It's been something I've wanted to dabble in but have not had time. What I really want to do is buy one of these and cobble up some sensors. But I also have to pt together a high-speed (short duration) flash.
You can buy these, but the duration is still 9 microseconds. For sub microsecond flash durations, you really can't use a xenon tube.
Yep, that seals it, you are pure evil!
True, xenon has its (severe) limits. If I ever get brave enough, I'd like to build an air-discharge flash. Buying one looks *very* expensive. I'm even afraid to ask what the Prism Science SPOT flash costs :-P
I believe that the SPOT units are less expensive than the Microflash units. The Microflash units are sealed to IP65 and use rechargable batteries. The SPOT is not sealed and plugs into 115VAC. When I checked in 2010, the SPOT units were about $3000. Not cheap, but less than the Micros.
If you want to design and build something, I'd be happy to lend my help, engineering/fabrication expertise or what-not if you'd like to build more than one. However, when I looked into it several months ago, it didn't really seem that cost-effective to go the DIY route.
