Diamond Turning
Single Point Diamond Turning is a technique for producing optical quality surfaces using a lathe configuration with a diamond-tipped tool. A primary advantage of this technique is the ability to produce complex aspheric surfaces efficiently. It is generally suited to metals and softer crystalline and amorphous optical materials such as ZnS, ZnSe, Ge, Si, and CaF2. The technique can be used to produce rotationally symmetric and off-axis aspheric optics, diffractive optics, and even non-rotationally symmetric optics such as cylinders.
REO can produce optics with diameters from 6.35mm up to 200mm using diamond turning, with a departure from best-fit-sphere of up to 1mm, and surface roughness per material as specified in the table below:
| Material | RMS Surface Roughness Å |
| CaF2 | 50 |
| Si | 50 |
| Ge | 20 |
| ZnSe | 40 |
| ZnS | 40 |
| Al | 35 |
| Cu | 20 |
Metal components can be produced in sizes up to 12 inches (300 mm), with virtually any aspheric profile, including both rotationally and non-rotationally symmetric (e.g. cylindrically aspheric and toroidal) curves, as well as off-axis parabolas .
- Up to 250 mm diameter
- Figure accuracy: ¼ wave
- Surface quality 20-20
