Ross Optical Blog: The Latest News & Research

Ross has been providing quality thin-film coatings on our optics for over a decade, and last year we announced a partnership with Penn Optical Coatings to extend our capabilities even further. Here are five reasons you should consider integrating optical coatings onto your components at the time of purchase:

A "dome" is an optical element that features a concave internal surface that is precisely matched to a convex exterior surface so that the interior and exterior surfaces are parallel and equally spaced over the entire optical element. The most common use of a dome optic is as a protective window from water, wind, radiation, or debris. Chemical and mechanical stability make glass and acrylic very popular materials for domes. Domes of this type are used for applications such as security systems, remote-controlled vehicles (such as the Mars rovers!), solar radiation sensors, underwater photography, and submarine portals. Dome windows are preferred over flat windows for four reasons:

This article is the last of our three-part series on optical design secrets. In previous blogs we explained some important aspects of optical manufacturing, and we offered advice on how to protect your production schedule by using reliable optics sourcing to defend your optics supply chain. This final article provides some best practices to follow when using optical design software. There are too many programs and applications for us to give software-specific advice, but our optical design expertise enables us to provide some important principles that apply whenever you use software to optimize the performance of an optical system design .

This article is the second in our three-part series on "secrets" that good optical designers must understand in order to become great. These tips are things that you can only learn from experience---or reading these articles!

In this article, we identify some of the supply-side challenges that optical designers face and offer some solutions. This knowledge will help you develop and protect your supply chain.

This article is the first of a three-part series on aspects of design that are sometimes overlooked in optics courses. Optical design is often as much art as science. However, it is not magic! Like any art or science, skill in the trade comes only with experience and practice. That said, you can save time by learning from the experience of others.

The optical assembly process is often treated as an afterthought of the design process; however, once a product has gone into production, assembly becomes a dominant cost. Designing for ease of assembly becomes a considerable cost-saver in the long run. Below we offer three important points to consider as you develop a product.

Our series explains how Ross Optical can help you reduce lead time on your orders. This article will explain the three factors that most impact lead time for optical components:

• Choice of materials
• Method of fabrication
• Method of testing

While these three factors impact any manufacturing process, they present unique challenges in optical manufacturing.

In the design of any optical system, managing cost versus performance is always a challenge. When faced with this challenge, it is important to realize that properly tolerancing the design is every bit as important as the design itself.

For companies struggling with supply chain dilemmas, one of the solutions we offer is blanket purchase orders to help ensure a reliable stream of components. To understand whether a blanket purchase order is right for you, you need to understand how they work.

The Situation