Product developers at Cedrat Technologies in France have come up with two new applications of magnetic technology for mechatronics. One accomplishes contactless sensing for position measurement in the centimeter range while the other is a magnetic-based fast steering mirror for space optics.
The inductive magnetic sensors allow a non-contact distance measurement up to 4 centimeters. They are available with different sensor technologies to match with customer specifications in terms of resolution, dimensions, power and bandwidth. The QuickScan tire wear sensor is one of numerous applications of the technology.
Magnetic-based fast steering mirror
To cope with performances of fine pointing and fast steering that are required on pointing mirrors for space optical communication, Cedrat engineers have developed and qualified Fast Steering Mirror technologies during the TELCO-B Artes project. The company’s M-FSM45 is a magnetic based fast steering mirror of +15 mm diameter clear aperture in silicon carbide, metallic or glass substrate with +50 mrad angular stroke. It can be equipped with an Eddy Current positioning sensor for accurate positioning control.
One of the main design constraints of an embedded optics mechanism, notes the company, is to keep mirror surface deformation to a minimum to limit the induced optical wave front error below the requirements. In this case, a maximum of 40nm rms RWE at 0° mirror surface flatness is the target, corresponding to a 20nm rms optical surface flatness. To ensure that the specification would be reached, Cedrat engineers used tools developed for previous space optical mechanisms projects including evaluation of induced surface deformation caused by mechanical biases, thermal deformation as well as optimization of mirror shape and dimensions. For more info, see www.cedrat-technologies.com.
