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[July 2001]
Robotic Polishers from Optical Sciences Lab Work
Work on optical sciences has led to the development of a 7-axis robotic polisher enabling automatic and fast polishing with computer control. The machines can be used for a variety of surfaces, including quality glass and crystals, metals, plastics, semiconductor materials and ceramics.
The softball robotic polishing head provides distributed pressure for the polishing of spherical, aspheric and, ultimately, free-form surfaces. The machine has been programmed to calculate the three-dimensional motion of the polishing head in order to correct errors in the form of the lens or mirror surface and achieve a very high quality finish.
Initially developed for polishing large optics at the Optical Sciences Laboratory at University College London (UCL), the 'Intelligent Robotic Polisher (IRO)' concept has been commercialised by Zeeko Ltd, a company specifically formed to produce this equipment.
Dr David Walker, Director of UCL's Optical Science Laboratory and founder Technical Director of Zeeko, commented: "What we have is a series of revolutionary lens and mirror polishing machines with capabilities that have never before been achieved. It's very rewarding to see a project that started on a laboratory desk at UCL develop into a spin-out company. We are now at the really exciting stage of seeing opportunities for this technology that we never dreamt of when we started, such as polishing prosthetic joints, spectacle lenses, turbine blades and industrial moulds".
For more information, e-mail David Walker at:
ddw@star.ucl.ac.uk
ENDS