Siskiyou Patents Adjustment Mechanism for Optical Mounts

Siskiyou Corp. has been awarded a U.S. Patent (No. 8,925,409) for an actuating mechanism that it says improves the performance of top-adjusted optical mounts and linear translation stages.

The mechanism isolates the rotation motion of the adjustment screw from the moving part of the mount or stage, so that turning the adjustor imparts only linear, and virtually no torsional, motion. The company has already incorporated the technology into its IXF series monolithic, top-adjust flexure mounts and 50cr-T series top-adjust, crossed roller bearing linear stages.

"Top-adjusted optical mounts are an especially useful tool for making systems more compact," said Siskiyou President Robert Hodge. "This is because these can be placed much closer together than traditional mounts, which require open space at their rear for actuator access.

"But top adjustment necessarily requires that the actuator force be applied perpendicular to the direction of mount motion. And this opens up the possibility that rotation of the adjustment screw will cause some slight twisting in the mount or stage in that perpendicular direction, as well as preloading the setup with rotational stress which can lead to shifts over time. For today's increasingly high performance laser-based instruments, even this slight motion, at the micron level, simply can’t be tolerated."

Siskiyou provides a range of micromanipulators, microscope sample positioners, motion control systems, and modular optomechanical mounts and positioners to life science and photonics researchers and OEMs.