Gooch & Housego : Expanded Optics Online – Find the Custom Optics You need More Easily

Gooch and Housego are pleased to bring together, for the first time, a wide variety of comprehensive tools to enable customers to learn more about our precision optics capabilities. We have added, in depth and breadth, more information from corner cubes to electro-optical sighting systems to our website and 2017 print brochure. Understanding that 'seeing is believing', we toured our facility in Glenrothes with video cameras so that customers can see how we design, manufacture, and test custom optics and systems.

Custom products can be hard to describe. Production managers are sometimes hesitant to print a list of specifications for fear the potential new customer will see these as limits of capabilities. New for 2017, we have added tables of specifications as a starting point for a discussion.

The simplicity of the prism function belies the complexity of its manufacture. G&H have developed techniques that not only enable precise fabrication of the prism surfaces and angles, but also manufacture the very smallest of prisms and the very largest. Tiny prisms are used in light-weighted laser systems. Large prisms are utilized as beamsplitters for imaging systems. Corner cubes are used in laser targeting systems and spectroscopy instrumentation. Changes in industry dynamics have led to our position as the 'go-to' company for the unusual and difficult to manufacture, coat, and assemble.

Our lens production capabilities span the spectrum, from the UV to the far IR. Uniquely, we can also combine hybrid production techniques such as diffractive and refractive surface finishing on the same part. As the original provider of superpolished components, we also combine super-polishing with small radius of curvature (SROC) capabilities. From aspheric to step-profiles to off-axis shapes, our lens manufacturing capabilities truly are industry leading.

Customers bring their difficult-to-manufacture designs to our engineers; we work together to create and optimize a design-for-manufacture, improving performance and deliveries.

From tank windows to super-polished synchrotron mirrors, G&H delivers an unparalleled breadth of polishing capabilities and performance coatings. Our ring-laser gyro components have been deployed into satellites and nearly every commercial aircraft. High energy beamsplitters enable high power laser systems which are revolutionizing modern manufacturing. The diversity of our flat polishing and coating capabilities includes:

• 1 Å surface roughness & 5-2 scratch-dig superpolished synchrotron mirrors
• Zerodur® ring laser gyro frames up to 500 mm in size, < 1 arc second in angular tolerance, and <1/50th wave wavefront distortion
• Dielectric, protected and enhanced metal mirrors from UV to the FIR
• 450 mm diameter defense-grade windows with durable diamond-like coatings

After our Q-switches, we are perhaps best known for our waveplate production capabilities. Our deeply vertical supply chain has enabled us to make the widest breadth of waveplates available from one manufacturer, as well as providing the unique capability to stretch the performance limits of waveplates:

• UV to IR waveplates with retardation tolerances up to /500
• KDP or KD*P waveplates up to 430 mm in diameter
• LIDT of > 10J/cm2, 10 ns pulses at 1064 nm

From the simplest lens assemblies to complex opto-mechanical assemblies, we have been providing design, manufacture, and testing capabilities to customers across the globe. In addition to our own designs, we work with a wide variety of customers from medical system designers to laser targeting engineers to create purpose-built, design-for-manufacture optical systems. A difficult capability to describe, we welcome in-depth conversations with our customers to provide the right combination of integration for optimal value.

• SWIR lens assemblies optimized to leverage benefits of new, larger InGaAs detectors
• Continuous zoom assemblies
• Laser cavity beam steering assemblies
• Electro-optic sighting systems for armored fighting vehicles

Virtual tours

Virtual tours leaving daily are available online from our website. Currently we have videos covering:

• A tour of our Glenrothes facility where we specialize in commercial and military optics for imaging and sensing
• Single-point diamond turning
• MRF finishing
• Optical coating
• Metrology

Custom or bespoke

Custom, or bespoke, components are our specialty.

Our website and 2017 brochure catalog our custom capabilities for fabricating, manufacturing, and assembling precision optical components. It is meant to be a starting point for discussions between your engineers and our engineers. 70 years of providing custom optics has demonstrated to us that what we can design and make together - in partnership with our customers - will likely be smaller or larger, lighter, more precise, or more rugged than what was produced before.

Call us today to start designing tomorrow; or else come along and talk to us at Photonics West on our booth, no. 1902. Whatever your OEM photonics needs, our experts will be on hand to advise regarding industrial, life science, and defense imaging, sensing and laser challenges. If you'd like to book an appointment, email us in advance at [e-mail].