Optical Mounts available from Stock
Our broad range of optical mounts available from stock is designed for demanding applications and offers exceptional performance with a wide variety of flexible options. Precision-rolled 100 TPI adjustment screws with hardened steel or carbide balls running on carbide pads or hardened rods guarantee excellent resolution and manual feel as well as stable movement.
AMS Technologies carries mirror mounts with flexure or kinematic mechanisms for 2 or 3 axes, made from aluminum, nickel-plated steel or stainless steel and ideal for supporting optics with diameters from 0.5 inch to 4.0 inch.
Various mounting options are available (also for right or left hand compatibility), such as front or side adjusted mounts, but also top-adjusted or vertical mounts. Thread diameters range from M2.5 to M6. Optic clips are also available from stock, reducing wave front distortion and providing secure mounting of round optics into flexure and kinematic mirror mounts.
Product Portfolio
In addition to our mirror mounts available from stock, we support a range of monolithic flexures machined from a single piece of metal, providing the ultimate in stability, even in challenging environments. Since they are not stamped, formed or welded, there are no built-in stresses.
Designed to be either panel- or bracket-mounted, these mirror mounts allow a wide variety of mounting options. Three versions are available: steel-bulkhead mounted, steel bulkhead/post mounted and aluminum-bulkhead/post mounted. Single-axis versions can be stacked to provide a wide variety of adjustment axis combinations.
Series with variants are specifically designed for OEM applications or feature clear apertures cut out to maximize beam clearance for beam splitter applications, also available for top adjustment.
Our series of industrial-grade kinematic mechanism optical mounts for 2-axis or 3-axis adjustment offer exceptional performance with a wide variety of flexible options, and our series of top-adjusted or vertical kinematic mechanism optical mounts guarantee zero-crosstalk, true orthogonal motion between the tip and tilt axes. Accessories include mounting blocks, angle brackets or adapters for horizontal or 45-degree mount.
To meet the demands of many different applications, AMS Technologies carries a series of XY, XYZ and 5-axis lens positioners or optic translators in three sizes, featuring colour-coded, soft-touch knob caps that are comfortable to use and provide quick axis location in low light conditions.
A series of gimbaled mounts for lens and laser diode positioning in industrial applications is available that covers a broad spectrum of optic configurations, from simple 2-axis models to 4-axis laser diode positioners providing x, y, tip and tilt in a small, robust package.
Related Products
The main purpose of our optical mounts is to support, hold and adjust the position of high-precision optical components – available from AMS Technologies in a very broad spectrum, ranging from optical mirrors, optical lenses, optical assemblies, optical windows, prisms, beamsplitters or optical filters to fiber collimators and focusers, and also lasers and light sources.
Additionally, we carry a broad range of complementary products such as linear, rotation and tilt stages, motion controllers or optical tables, breadboards and platforms, as well as of optical test and measurement equipment.
Definition
Optical holders not only fulfil the task of mechanically fixing sensitive items, e.g. optical mirrors, optical lenses, optical filters, optical prisms, optical polarizers or other optical components like laser assemblies, without damaging them. As an important component in optical systems, they also allow these optical components to be positioned at the desired location and aligned in several axes with high precision.
For this purpose, a permanently mounted carrier plate allows the mobile counterplate to be precisely adjusted at various angles, usually in multiple axes, using adjustment screws with very fine, low-pitch threads.
Kinematic mounts are the most common type of optical mount and offer very good stability and distortion-free mounting of optical components at relatively low cost. However, with this type of mount, the adjustment axes for the various degrees of freedom are located outside the optical axis, which means that a change in one axis usually also causes unwanted changes due to a shift in the other axes (cross-talk). In addition, a (mostly undesirable) translational displacement of the optics also occurs.
In contrast to kinematic mounts, gimbal mounts offer two mutually perpendicular axes of rotation, each of which is firmly defined in space. Because this mount type’s axes intersect in the center of the surface of the mounted optical element, an adjustment in one axis does not affect the position relative to the other axis. However, gimbal mounts are usually larger and tend to be more expensive.
In a flexure mount, the elastic deformation of a given material allows the angle of the mounted component to change. This type of mount is particularly compact and insensitive to vibrations, which is why flexure mounts are often used in optical systems where space is limited. However, they have a limited adjustment range, and temperature fluctuations have a greater effect on the adjustment.
Alternative Terms: Mirror Mount; Optics Mount; Optics Holder; Kinematic Mount; Flexure Mount; Bulkhead Mount; Post Mount; Gimbal Mount
