Mcdonnell Douglas Corporation

Mcdonnell Douglas Corporatin

Ronald Alfred Ferrante

Rudolf Herman Ott

Gordon H Burkhart

The UV blocking coating includes at least eight alternating layers of a first dielectric material and a second dielectric material stacked upon the surface of an optical substrate to thereby form windows, windscreens, lenses or the like. The first dielectric material has a higher index of refraction then the second dielectric material. For example, the first dielectric material can be TiO.sub.2, ZrO.sub.2 and Ta.sub.2 O.sub.5 and the second dielectric material can be MgF.sub.2 or SiO.sub.2. In addition, each layer of the second dielectric material has an optical thickness which is greater than the optical thickness of the underlying layer of the first dielectric material upon which the layer of the second dielectric material is stacked. As a result of the unique construction of the UV blocking coating, the reflectance of the UV blocking coating varies dramatically upon exposure to UV light on the one hand and to visible light on the other hand. In particular, the reflectance of the UV blocking coating as a function of wavelength defines a high reflectance region in which greater than 90% and, more typically, greater than 95% of UV light having a wavelength of 350 nm to 400 nm is reflected and a low reflectance region in which less than 5% and, more commonly, less than 2% of visible light having a wavelength of 450 nm to 700 nm is reflected.

Ultraviolet blocking coating and associated coated optical element

The graded dielectric combiner, such as for a dual heads up display (HUD) combiner, is fabricated by depositing a predetermined number of dielectric layers upon a substrate and by thereafter selectively removing at least some of the dielectric layers from a graded portion of the dielectric combiner. As a result, the number of dielectric layers disposed upon the substrate will vary across the graded portion of the combiner. More specifically, the graded portion of the combiner may include a number of bands. A predetermined percentage of each band includes the predetermined number of dielectric layers, while the remainder of each band includes less than the predetermined number of dielectric layers. Since the dielectric layers are deposited in a conventional fashion, however, the thickness of each remaining dielectric layer will be uniform across the substrate. The graded dielectric combiners can thereafter be assembled to form a dual HUD combiner having first and second combiners in which one or both combiners are graded within the overlap region, thereby reducing, if not eliminating, the dark band and other visual nonuniformities introduced by the overlapped combiners of conventional dual HUD combiners.

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Corona, CA, United States of America

Ronald Alfred Ferrante