ABSOLUTE INTERFEROMETRY FOR THE MACHINE TOOL INDUSTRY

THERE IS SUBSTANTIAL NEED FOR NEW SENSORS WHICH MEASURE ABSOLUTE DISTANCE FOR APPLICATIONS IN ROBOTIC POSITIONING, MACHINE VISION, AUTOMATIC INSPECTION AND GAUGING. WITH ITS ABILITY TO MEASURE NON-CONTINUOUS CHANGES IN POSITION, THE SENSOR COULD PROVIDE FEEDBACK MEASUREMENTS FOR CLOSED LOOP POSITION CONTROL FOR ROBOTS, CMMS AND MACHINE TOOLS. FOR AUTOMATIC INSPECTION, A HIGHLY ACCURATE DISTANCE MEASURING SENSOR WILL REDUCE THE NEED FOR MECHANICAL TOUCH PROBES WHICH ARE VERY SLOW. FOR MACHINE VISION, THE ABILITY TO MEASURE RANGE WILL ELIMINATE THE NEED FOR COMPLICATED ALGORITHMS WHICH EXTRACT INFORMATION FROM INTENSITY IMAGES. FASTMAN HAS DEVELOPED A NEW TYPE OF INTERFEROMETER WHICH FILLS MANY OF THESE SENSOR NEEDS. IT IS CAPABLE OF MAKING MEASUREMENTS WITH A LARGER RANGE-TO-ACCURACY RATIO THAN ANY OTHER SENSOR TECHNOLOGY. IT IS ALSO CAPABLE OF MAKING MEASUREMENTS IN THE PRESENCE OF VIBRATIONS AND OTHER ERROR SOURCES WHICH RENDER CONVENTIONAL INTERFEROMETERS INEFFECTUAL. THUS IT IS CAPABLE OF BEING APPLIED IN MANUFACTURING ENVIRONMENTS. FASTMAN HAS FABRICATED A PROTOTYPE ABSOLUTE INTERFEROMETER WITH A RANGE OF 1 INCH AND AN ACCURACY OF 10(-4) INCHES. INTHIS PROJECT WE WILL REPLACE THE PROTOTYPE'S LASER DIODES WITH NEW QUANTUM WELL LASERS. THIS WILL INCREASE THE ACCURACY TO 10(-8) INCHES AND THE RANGE TO 10 INCHES. WE WILL STUDY AND CLASSIFY THE APPLICATIONS OF OUR SENSOR TECHNOLOGY IN THE MACHINE TOOL INDUSTRY AND CARRYOUT EXPERIMENTS TO DEMONSTRATE ITS APPLICABILITY TO ONE MACHINE TOOL SENSOR NEED: THE MEASUREMENT OF MATERIAL REMOVED BY A GRINDING MACHINE. FINALLY, WE WILL DETERMINE A PRELIMINARY DESIGN FOR AN INTEGRATED OPTIC VERSION OF THE SENSOR.