kommando messing with lasers, please advise

[Rolf Mützelburg]

This is my first post, so please excuse me for posting my life story:

Me and my nerd friends have always been military geeks, playing with toy guns when we were kids, and as we got older, real guns... MURICA!

Anyway, the problem with playing with real guns is they kinda hurt when we shoot each other with them. Thankfully there is paintball, and airsoft which scratches the itch without literally drawing blood... but, after popping cans at the range, we couldn't help but notice how LAME the airsoft and paintball guns were at anything over 50m. Many times we'd be aiming our bb-guns like howitzers and still fall short of our target who was standing in the open flipping us the bird. Not exactly the tactical engagement we wanted.

So one day I said, 'the problem with these guns is that to be safe, they can't shoot at high velocity, and so they have no range. Projectiles are just too dangerous at high velocity, no matter the material. So why not lazers?'

And honestly, we were stuck on that for a few years. No one seems to be filling that market. So we decided we'd try and make our own. How hard can it be?

So, the question I have is where do I start? I understand the basic idea: prism, mirror on one end, gas or solid material to act as a Cristal, semi transparent mirror for an exit, pumping photons and stuff. Making a laser is probably out of our league. I just want to learn the theoretical stuff first so I can figure out If this is even doable. There must be a reason why this never took off Comercially!

The military has the MILES training system, which uses IR 'beams' not really proper quality lasers, but to be fair, we don't need that kinda precision and neither do they. A beam of photons that can hit a single target is what we need. It only needs to be accurate enough so that at 700m, if you aim at the guy standing next to the target, you can't hit both with one shot. The military apparently figured this out back in the late 80s. We can't seem to figure it out ourselves. MILES uses IR, I would have thought UV would be better because the smaller wave length would make it more compact.

Any reading material yall think could help us, before we start sticking lasers inside of AR15 husks and getting our hands dirty? Its a DIY project, so funds are limited. Precision is not important to us, we just want a way of simulating gun fire without projectiles, in a compact machine that can be soldered like a rifle. The IR models I've seen look like they are aiming with satalite dishes, which is way to large to mount on the end of or inside a rifle. I can't find any skematics on the MILES system the army uses. Just pictures of it during use.

[helius]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_tag
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_safety

You don't want ultraviolet because of its increased dispersion in the air and the requirement for quartz lenses, which are very expensive.

[floobydust]

I think what you are looking for is called 'laser tag'. Seach for laser tag schematic
Depending on range and accuracy, a LED or laser (IR or visible) is pulsed.
The receiver on the vest is just an IR receiver module used in remote-controls, with the signal going to a microcontroller.

It is possible for each gun to transmit a digital number, so you can tell who or what team hit you. Or for picking up treasures, the treasure can transmit a number to prove you collected it.

Build Your Own Laser Tag System

[Brumby]

So, the question I have is where do I start? I understand the basic idea: prism, mirror on one end, gas or solid material to act as a Cristal, semi transparent mirror for an exit, pumping photons and stuff. Making a laser is probably out of our league.

You don't have to get that intimate with the construction of a laser.  The example you are referring to is related to the technology of early days.  Today, you don't have to be so tied up with the theory of lasers and how to build them.  You can buy pre-built laser modules that are smaller than a 45 caliber round for just a few dollars.

And, yes, the term to search for is "laser tag".