Output characteristics of a waveguide CO2 laser with plane mirrors

A study was made of the influence of misalignment of the plane mirrors of a waveguide CO₂ laser on the output power and mode structure of the radiation. It was found that misalignment of the resonator only weakly affected the output power, but exerted a strong influence on the beam divergence and maximum radiation intensity in the far-field zone. A qualitative agreement was obtained between the experimental results and the proposed theoretical model.