Isothermal precision glass molding of imaging optics is the key technology for mass production of precise optical elements. Especially for numerous consumer applications (e.g. digital cameras, smart phones, …), high precision glass molding is applied for the manufacturing of aspherical lenses. The usage of diffractive optical elements (DOEs) can help to further reduce the number of lenses in the optical systems which will lead to a reduced weight of hand-held optical devices. But today the application of molded glass DOEs is limited due to the technological challenges in structuring the mold surfaces. Depending on the application submicrometer structures are required on the mold surface. Furthermore these structures have to be replicated very precisely to the glass lens surface. Especially the micro structuring of hard and brittle mold materials such as Tungsten Carbide is very difficult and not established. Thus a multitude of innovative approaches using diffractive optical elements cannot be realized. Aixtooling has investigated in different mold materials and different suitable machining technologies for the micro- and sub-micrometer structuring of mold surfaces. The focus of the work lays on ultra-precision grinding to generate the diffractive pattern on the mold surfaces. This paper presents the latest achievements in diffractive structuring of Tungsten Carbide mold surfaces by ultra-precision grinding.
Today isothermal precision molding of imaging glass optics has become a widely applied and integrated production
technology in the optical industry. Especially in consumer electronics (e.g. digital cameras, mobile phones, Blu-ray) a lot
of optical systems contain rotationally symmetrical aspherical lenses produced by precision glass molding. But due to
higher demands on complexity and miniaturization of optical elements the established process chain for precision glass
molding is not sufficient enough. Wafer based molding processes for glass optics manufacturing become more and more
interesting for mobile phone applications. Also cylindrical lens arrays can be used in high power laser systems. The
usage of unsymmetrical free-form optics allows an increase of efficiency in optical laser systems.
Aixtooling is working on different aspects in the fields of mold manufacturing technologies and molding processes for
extremely high complex optical components. In terms of array molding technologies, Aixtooling has developed a
manufacturing technology for the ultra-precision machining of carbide molds together with European partners. The
development covers the machining of multi lens arrays as well as cylindrical lens arrays. The biggest challenge is the
molding of complex free-form optics having no symmetrical axis. A comprehensive CAD/CAM data management along
the entire process chain is essential to reach high accuracies on the molded lenses. Within a national funded project
Aixtooling is working on a consistent data handling procedure in the process chain for precision molding of free-form
optics.
Conference Committee Involvement (1)
Polymer Optics and Molded Glass Optics: Design, Fabrication, and Materials 2016
29 August 2016 | San Diego, California, United States
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