The National Science Council yesterday hailed as an outstanding success the local production of large-caliber lenses expected to be widely used in the aerospace industry, including for the improvement of satellite remote-sensing.
Precision 300mm- and 160mm-caliber aspheric lenses were displayed at a press conference yesterday at the council's Precision Instrument Development Center (PIDC) in Hsinchu.
PHOTO: WANG MIN-WEI, TAIPEI TIMES
Lenses of 150mm caliber or greater are frequently used in the aerospace industry, said Huang Kuo-cheng (
"It's quite technically challenging to produce such large-caliber lenses, which must have high precision, be light-weight and which can be stabilized during dramatic temperature change," Huang said.
Huang said the success in producing the lenses demonstrated that the center was keeping pace with world-class companies such as Zeiss in Germany, Sagen in France and Japan's NEC in the development of optical devices.
"The maturation of our skills in producing large-caliber lenses will further boost satellite remote-sensing abilities, which rely on precision lenses to receive images remotely," Huang said.
According to PIDC director-general Chen Chien-jen (陳建人), the center has been involved in the ROCSAT-2 project since 1999. A critical lens of 600mm caliber installed in the ROCSAT-2 satellite was made by the Astrium Co in France, the main contractor for the project.
Inspired by a visit to an Astrium factory site in France three years ago, scientists and engineers at PIDC utilized the same substance, silicon carbide, whose properties include high specific stiffness and high thermal conductivity. The unit price of this substance is even higher than that for diamonds.
The newly-completed 160mm-caliber aspheric lens cost NT$2.5 million.
Two years ago, PIDC scientists and engineers began to polish raw materials purchased from Germany, including a highly durable Zerodur ceramic with an ultra-low thermal expansion coefficient. Eventually this was shaped into a 300mm-caliber aspheric lens, which cost about NT$3 million.
"The development of the two large-caliber lenses shows that Taiwan has ample resources for future development involving satellite remote-sensing technology," Chen said.
The two lenses weigh between 3kg and 4kg each.
Chen said that the production of precision large-caliber lenses involved advanced optical inspection technology.
The center is applying for a patent in Taiwan on a Null Lens aspheric surface measurement.
Such technology would also be used in weaponry for national defense and in the semiconductor industry, Chen said.
He said the center's precision manufacturing and testing facilities would soon be available at the Taichung Science Park.
The science park is home to firms developing nanotechnology, precision machinery and precision optics.
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