Hard day at work today. Trying to build a lens system that will take Infra Red laser light at 400 watts from almost 70 diodes in an array about 10 cm by 10 cm down to a wavefront that is 2 cm by 2 cm.
OK that’s do-able with the right sort of lenses.
But now getting that wavefront into the acceptance cone of a fiber optic cable, about 1/10 mm by 1/10 mm, and keeping the coherence, and the phase, not so easy. The light has to be monochromatic, coherent, and in-phase to go many kilometers through fiber optic cable. Making it bright enough is one problem, but then squeezing it down so it gets into the cable is big headache. I may have to go do more reading.
You think it’s easy, you should try it.
I am at my wit’s end.
I console myself with the fact that I’m not planning a claim in this area. My claims are all for other parts of the machine. But I take pride in drawing a describing machines that will work.
I could simply say the light goes into the fiber by means of technology familiar to persons skilled in that field. That would be OK. The Patent Examiner would accept that, as long as there are such persons, and there are, for sure.
It’s galling to not be able to show the entire machine and describe in detail how every part of it works. I am “The Photon Wrangler”, I should be able to do this.
Next week, I come back to my work bench and try again.
Patience and perseverance made a Bishop of his Reverence
Edison did not give up. He’s my hero.
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