Ross Optical Blog: The Latest News & Research

Using Reverse Engineering and Custom Optics to Meet Changing Industry Needs

Optical systems are highly integrated, and every component plays a critical role in achieving precise performance. But when a product is discontinued, it can disrupt the entire system. For example, a single lens made from Schott F4 glass may have been selected for its unique refractive index and transmission properties. If that lens becomes unavailable, what’s next?

In the realm of precision optics, few lens configurations offer the balance of performance and versatility of Steinheil triplets . At Ross Optical, these lenses are a cornerstone of our catalog, serving industries that demand high-quality imaging and beam control.

There are some critical steps needed in order to create an effective optical design. Whether a basic design or complex, it is important to find a supplier that can produce your product in a quick, cost-effective way. Ross Optical is a reliable partner known to improve time to market and optimize your product performance.

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 .

A previous article explored applications of cylinder lenses. In those examples, the lenses were only curved on one side—the other side was flat (i.e. "plano-"). Cylinder lenses can be curved on both sides, though, creating a "rod lens." Rod lenses are unique in that they can be used either side-on or end-on depending upon the application. Here are three examples of their versatility.

The Situation

Over the last several years, Ross Optical has worked closely with the engineering and purchasing team at Microtrac to provide custom optics that support their particle analysis instruments.

For years, Ross Optical has been supplying catalog cylinders and optical cylinder sets to customers in laser diode, measurement instrumentation, and other industries. While cylinders are used in a broad range of applications, we are seeing the most recent demand for their use in line generators.

For better or worse, we do “judge a book by its cover.” Appearance can override our better judgment. It’s tempting to judge the quality of an optical element based on its appearance, but that overlooks the element’s role within the overall optical system. In this article we’ll consider three types of surface irregularities and explore how each type can affect optical performance.

3 Reasons to Reverse Engineer

“Reverse engineering” is a term with a bad reputation. It calls to mind patent violations and expensive legal wranglings. There are legitimate situations, though, when a company might need to work backwards to design an optical component that matches the performance of a commercial item.