Abstract. In joint alignment of laser transmitting and receiving modules of an active laser optoelectronic device (laser locator, rangefinder or altimeter), an installation with a collimator is used. If the device field-of-view angle exceeds one degree, a lens collimator should be used for adjustment. When applied lens collimator is designed for a wavelength other than that of the laser emitter, the collimator aberrations lead to errors in determining centroids of the scattering spots in the focal plane and result in sighting error (direction-finding error). The effects of aberrations of a lens collimator with field-of-view angle of 8o are studied. After optimization of the collimator initially designed for the visible spectral range, the direction-finding error for the wavelength of 1064 nm is reported to decrease several times.   

Keywords: collimator, aberrations, alignment, installation, direction-finding error, sight error

References:

1. Cole T.D., Boies M.T., El-Dinary A.S. et al. Proc. SPIE, Lidar Techniques for Remote Sensing II, 1995, vol. 2581. DOI: 10.1117/12.228504 
2. Ramos-Izquierdo L., Bufton J.L., Hayes P. Applied Optics, 1994, no. 3(33).
3. Chakraborty S., Affolter M., Gunderson K. et al. Applied Optics, 2012, no. 20(51).
4. Kuvaldin E.V., Ershov A.G., Zakharenkov V.F. et al. Proc. of SPIE, 2010, vol. 7544, рр. 754457.
5. Ershov A.G. Vestnik NPO im. S.A. Lavochkina, 2012, no. 5, pp. 73–79. (in Russ.)
6. Ershov A.G. Journal of Instrument Engineering, 2015, no. 7(58), pp. 537–542. (in Russ.)