Hello everyone and thank you for reading. As a brief background, I consider myself an assembler of kits, but posses minimal knowledge as far as circuit design or product selection/cross referencing. I have spent considerable time on the site trying to read all the conversations on similar circuits, potential problems, design considerations/flaws, etc so that I hopefully don't ask already-answered or uneducated questions. Unfortunately, I have been unable to come up with a setup quite like I am looking for and specifically the products/methods I should use for the best result. So that it is clear what I am looking for/how it would ideally work, this will be kind of a long post which I apologize for.
Ultimately, I am wanting to make a dry-fire-activated laser system for target practice with a pistol. There are some similar systems on the internet that offer a complete bulls eye of laser receivers and indicate where your shot landed on the target, etc. They are considerably more money than I believe need to be invested in the system and more complicated than I really am looking for. To simplify the project, I would like to make a very small and simple acoustically-activated laser that lights for about 1 second when it hears the loud click of the pistol hammer hitting the firing pin. As far as the "target", just a single laser receiver with a small buzzer and LED that would activate for 1 second or so to indicate the target has been hit would be the perfect system.
I am really looking for help with the schematics and the necessary parts to achieve the two items listed above. Once I have a proof-of-concept and proof-of-function for the system, I plan to try to to convert everything to surface-mount parts and cram them into as small of an enclosure as possible so that the laser could be fitted inside of the barrel of the gun to provide the most accuracy, and so that the "target" could be extremely portable and carried in a pocket for practice whenever/wherever you have a few free minutes.
The laser would be powered by small button batteries (guessing 2 or 3 to get 6 or 9 volts) and would ideally have a rough laser size of 3/4" at 25' from the target. I believe this should provide a reasonable size dot to activate the target without having to be so accurate that you would never be able to hit the target.
The "target" I think should be powered by 9v battery (possibly with option for a plug-in 12v wall wort if everything else goes well). This system would be used indoors, but I am very concerned with the photo transistor being completely washed out by ambient light. I have played around with a few parts and managed to get a photo transistor, 10k uf capacitor, 5k resistor, NPN transistor, LED (and resistor), a 9v battery, and the reflector from a mini-mag light to activate from a laser but the optics were so washed out by ambient light in a normal room that it was ultimately useless. With that in mind, I believe to provide the best results a filter for ambient light and some form of funnel to direct the remaining light to the photo transistor would be necessary, and possibly even something I could use as a lens would be necessary. Though it seemed to funnel enough light, I would prefer to find a more assembler-friendly and available product than having to buy/disassemble mag lights and glue the reflectors to a PCB. With that in mind, I think the large opening of the funnel should be about 3/4" and the small end determined by the photo transistor.
As mentioned, my knowledge of the application of electronic components is very limited, and the specifications/application of laser devices is even less than that. I appreciate any help, drawings, product suppliers for specific parts, etc that you guys can provide. I know electronic components are largely inexpensive, but by the time I might get something like this put together based off of several different schematics (and guesses) and burnt up parts, it would have been easier and much cheaper for me to just ask for help in the first place. So thank you in advance, I appreciate the help immensely.
Ultimately, I am wanting to make a dry-fire-activated laser system for target practice with a pistol. There are some similar systems on the internet that offer a complete bulls eye of laser receivers and indicate where your shot landed on the target, etc. They are considerably more money than I believe need to be invested in the system and more complicated than I really am looking for. To simplify the project, I would like to make a very small and simple acoustically-activated laser that lights for about 1 second when it hears the loud click of the pistol hammer hitting the firing pin. As far as the "target", just a single laser receiver with a small buzzer and LED that would activate for 1 second or so to indicate the target has been hit would be the perfect system.
I am really looking for help with the schematics and the necessary parts to achieve the two items listed above. Once I have a proof-of-concept and proof-of-function for the system, I plan to try to to convert everything to surface-mount parts and cram them into as small of an enclosure as possible so that the laser could be fitted inside of the barrel of the gun to provide the most accuracy, and so that the "target" could be extremely portable and carried in a pocket for practice whenever/wherever you have a few free minutes.
The laser would be powered by small button batteries (guessing 2 or 3 to get 6 or 9 volts) and would ideally have a rough laser size of 3/4" at 25' from the target. I believe this should provide a reasonable size dot to activate the target without having to be so accurate that you would never be able to hit the target.
The "target" I think should be powered by 9v battery (possibly with option for a plug-in 12v wall wort if everything else goes well). This system would be used indoors, but I am very concerned with the photo transistor being completely washed out by ambient light. I have played around with a few parts and managed to get a photo transistor, 10k uf capacitor, 5k resistor, NPN transistor, LED (and resistor), a 9v battery, and the reflector from a mini-mag light to activate from a laser but the optics were so washed out by ambient light in a normal room that it was ultimately useless. With that in mind, I believe to provide the best results a filter for ambient light and some form of funnel to direct the remaining light to the photo transistor would be necessary, and possibly even something I could use as a lens would be necessary. Though it seemed to funnel enough light, I would prefer to find a more assembler-friendly and available product than having to buy/disassemble mag lights and glue the reflectors to a PCB. With that in mind, I think the large opening of the funnel should be about 3/4" and the small end determined by the photo transistor.
As mentioned, my knowledge of the application of electronic components is very limited, and the specifications/application of laser devices is even less than that. I appreciate any help, drawings, product suppliers for specific parts, etc that you guys can provide. I know electronic components are largely inexpensive, but by the time I might get something like this put together based off of several different schematics (and guesses) and burnt up parts, it would have been easier and much cheaper for me to just ask for help in the first place. So thank you in advance, I appreciate the help immensely.
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