QUALITY CONTROL
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A noncontact optical measurement system from Lumetrics (Rochester, NY, USA) is accurate to 0.1 µm.
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The most commonly used method for measuring medical tubing involves using a pin gauge to determine its inner diameter. “The main disadvantages of this method are that it is normally destructive and the accuracy of the data largely depends on the operator,” says Rob Vlosky, the firm’s director of marketing and sales. Determining the dimensions of angioplasty balloons is similarly limited by physical testing. “To measure angioplasty balloons, a technician generally crushes the balloon between a micrometer and divides the total thickness in half to estimate the individual wall thickness,” Vlosky explains. “The obvious fallacy in this method is an inability to tell if one wall is too thick or the opposite wall is too thin,” he adds.
Accurate to 0.1 µm, the OptiGauge is suited for measuring solid material as thick as 8 mm and tubing up to 10 mm in diameter. The system can be used for product testing on manufacturing lines, as well as in quality assurance laboratories. In addition, the OptiGauge simultaneously supports as many as eight probes that can be positioned up to 1000 m apart. The resulting data are integrated into a quality control database, where comparisons with the expected dimensions are used to generate pass or fail recommendations in real time.
Based on patented technology originally developed by Eastman Kodak, the unit projects an infrared light beam from an LED onto a transparent or translucent material. A PC equipped with proprietary software instantly analyzes light reflecting back from the material. If the evaluated object is comprised of layers, light reflecting from the layers is analyzed individually to determine their individual thicknesses. Advanced processing algorithms then display the widths of the individual layers using a graphical user interface.
The unit is available in Europe from the medical sales organization 2Spring (Tilburg, Netherlands).
