Experimental study of small-scale direct current-discharge drived continuous-wave DF chemical laser

A small-scale direct current(DC)-discharge excited continuous-wave(CW) DF chemical laser is studied through experiments. The output power of the laser reached 188.4 W and 205.8 W, at about 10 mm and 15 mm downstream of the nozzle exit plane respectively, at the wavelength of 3.6~4.1 m. The electrical-to-laser power conversion efficiency was about 2.3% and 2.5% respectively. The experiments show good PV stability of about 1.04% and RMA stability of about 0.49% for long time(100 s) running, and good repeatability. This small-scale DC-discharge excited CW DF chemical laser performs well and operates simply, is an applicable infrared laser source for absorption measurement of the optical films under high power density.