Found a dirt cheap laser level at Wally World (it even has a blue LED) that comes apart pretty easy and has lots of readily adaptable components. Haven’t managed to get the lens off the laser yet, but it doesn’t look to be too difficult to do once I get the right size screw driver. The wiring’s a bit shoddy, but that shouldn’t be too hard to fix. This may turn out to be easier than I thought!
Or maybe not. If you take the lens off the front, the beam will be an inch wide when you are three inches from the wall, and by the time you’re a foot away it will be so wide and dim that you’ll need the room dark to even see it.
Don’t forget the mumbo jumbo. Believe me, if the folks making these things didn’t need lenses, they wouldn’t spend the considerable money to develop and manufacture them. Calling it mumbo jumbo doesn’t make it unnecessary.
BTW I took apart a little laser pointer with a blue LED, and though it took alot of prying everything worked afterwards. But giving the laser chip a static electricity jolt is, according to many sources, the likliest way of killing it. Try adopting antistatic work methods like those described for CMOS electronics. Also, visit this absolutely wonderful site: