What is a Laser Power Meter?
A laser power meter is an optical instrument that is designed to measure the Radiant Intensity (i.e. power) of a pulsed or CW (continuous wave) laser in terms of Watts. The are typically made up of a laser probe (i.e. detector), electronics and a meter. The probe could include a thermal or photon detector. In either case they’re calibrated against a NIST traceable standard detector. The electronics, which could act like a voltage or current meter, are also calibrated against an electronic standard that is traceable to NIST. Laser Power Probes are designed to accommodate a wide variety of lasers whose output may be very high …like kilowatts …or low …like picowatts; they may have large beam diameters …like 25 mm or small beams like 0.5 mm. The laser being measured may emit in a single frequency or be tunable …and could be anywhere in the spectrum from Deep UV to Far IR. This likely explains the large variety of probes that are available. Some feature large size and high power c
