The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Dec. 23, 2003
Filed:
Apr. 19, 2001
Gabriel Y. Sirat, Jerusalem, IL;
Optimet, Optical Metrology Ltd., Jerusalem, IL;
Abstract
A system and method for maintaining a specified distance between the focus of a laser tooling beam of a laser machining system and a workpiece. The system includes an optical assembly for focusing the tooling beam substantially onto a spot on the surface of the workpiece and a beam splitter for deflecting light retro-reflected from the workpiece and through the optical assembly. The system also includes a distance-measuring apparatus, such as a conoscope, for receiving the retro-reflected beam and for determining the distance to the spot on the surface of the workpiece relative to a fiducial reference as well as a controller for governing the location of the workpiece relative to the focus of the optical assembly based on the measured distance of the spot.