Development of a lightweight active optic system for a spaceborne relay mirror application

The design and performance of an active optic figure control system for a spaceborne relay mirror application is described. Development centered on minimizing overall system weight while meeting a prescribed set of figure control requirements. The optic, an Ultra Low Expansion ULE, lightweight, 17 i...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Optical Engineering 1990-11, Vol.29 (11), p.1328-1332
Main Author: Janosky, Mark S
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Exact sciences and technology
Fundamental areas of phenomenology (including applications)
Optical workshop techniques
Optics
Physics
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:The design and performance of an active optic figure control system for a spaceborne relay mirror application is described. Development centered on minimizing overall system weight while meeting a prescribed set of figure control requirements. The optic, an Ultra Low Expansion ULE, lightweight, 17 in. hexagonal mirror, uses a combination of moment and force actuators to control the optical figure. Modeling of the mirror to determine the placement of the actuators that minimizes the rms aberrations at low spatial frequencies is discussed. It is shown that the actuator configuration chosen is capable of significantly correcting all primary Zernike terms up to trefoil (i.e., focus, tilt, power, coma, astigmatism, and trefoil) with the exception of spherical. Preliminary 'manual' closed loop operation of the system has demonstrated that the static optical figure of 2.5 waves peak-to-valley and 0.4 wave rms can be corrected to 0.5 wave peak-to-valley and 0.1 wave rms. (Author)
ISSN:0091-3286
1560-2303
DOI:10.1117/12.55734