Optical sight with rangefinder and assembly method for the same
The present invention provides an optical sight with rangefinder and assembly method thereof. The optical sight comprises an erector lens unit, a photoelectric rangefinding unit, a barrel, an objective lens unit, a plurality of adjusting elements, a power supply unit and an eyepiece lens unit disposed on the barrel. The photoelectric rangefinding unit includes a laser emitter, a laser receiver and a range indicator. A plurality of openings are formed on sidewall of the barrel corresponding to the positions of the laser emitter, laser receiver and range indicator for conducting the cavity to outside the barrel. The assembly method comprises the steps of: assembling the erector lens unit, the photoelectric rangefinding unit and the barrel together, then connecting an objective lens unit and mounting a plurality of adjusting elements, adjusting the objective lens unit and mounting the adjusting elements and the power supply unit, adjusting the focus of the laser emitter and the laser receiver and adjusting the position of the range indicator through the openings formed on the barrel for complying with the requirement of photoelectric rangefinding performance. The assembly method of the optical sight according to the present invention can be adjusted after all elements are assembled. The assembly method of the optical sight according to the present invention can be used to reduce the adjusting times and prevent unnecessary disassemblies and re-assemblies for simplifying the assembly process and improving the yield rate and the productibility of the optical sight.
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an optical sight and assembly method for the same, and more specifically, to a telescopic optical sight capable of rangefinding and assembly method for the same.
2. The Related Art
In general, an optical system of conventional telescopic sight comprises an objective lens assembly, an erector lens assembly, an eyepiece lens assembly and a scale board with a reticle. The scale board is marked with a rough rangefinding scale. A shooter can rapidly estimate the range to a target by referring to the rangefinding scale. Therefore, such conventional telescopic sight may be used as a simple rangefinder.
However, the range estimation of conventional telescopic sight is mostly depended on the user's experience that may likely bring a larger tolerance. Accordingly, a telescopic sight progressively takes the precise shooting and rangefinding fields. A conventional telescopic sight has been disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,771,623 issued on Jun. 30, 1998. The conventional telescopic sight mainly comprises an objective lens assembly, a laser transmitter (like a laser diode, LD), a laser receiver (like an avalanche photoelectric diode, APD), a range indicator (like a light emitting diode, LED) and three sets of prisms, erector lens unit and eyepiece lens unit which are provided with a dichroic coating. The laser transmitter and the laser receiver both constitute a rangefinder of the telescopic sight. The laser rangefinder operates on a principle of measuring a travel period from emission of a laser pulse or laser pulse sequence by the laser transmitter, via pulse reflection with a target aimed at, to a reflected pulse reception by the laser receiver. One half of the value that this travel period is multiplied by the light speed constant yields the distance between the rangefinder and target. The distance calculation is performed by a calculation device or program disposed within the telescopic sight.
Generally, several components adapted for conventional telescopic sight, like the objective lens unit, erector lens unit, rangefinding device and eyepiece lens unit, are modularized, individually, and each one is assembled and adjusted respectively into a barrel and then adjusted again after assembled. As the conventional telescopic sight disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,771,623, the erector lens unit thereof is firstly assembled generally, and then fixed on a fabrication fixture for adjusting a position of a reticle to reach a first image plane. Thereafter, the erector lens unit is mounted within a laser rangefinding unit, and the photoelectric rangefinding functions provided with coordination among the laser transmitter, laser receiver and range indicator are adjusted. The complete-adjusted laser rangefinding unit, the objective lens unit, an adjusting mechanism and a power supply unit are disposed into the barrel, respectively. The parallax of the objective lens unit is adjusted after assembled. Meanwhile, if any lens or the reticle becomes contaminated or slanted, each component should be detached from the barrel for adjusting each component before assembled again. Eventually, the eyepiece lens unit can be assembled with the barrel for accomplishing the assembly of the telescopic sight. A quality control procedure, including an optical performance inspection, a photoelectric rangefinding performance inspection, an impact strength inspection and an air-sealing inspection etc., is processed for the finished telescopic sight. If there is any performance varied within the need of re-adjusting, as aforementioned that any lens or the reticle becomes contaminated or slanted, each component should be detached from the barrel and then adjusted before assembled again. Obviously, each step in the assembly of the conventional telescopic sight, i.e. adjusting and assembling, must be repeated if there is any misstep appearing in the assembly. Understandingly, the assembly procedure of the conventional telescopic sight is more complicated and unfavorable to both the cost and manufacturing.
For above reasons, it is necessary to provide an optical sight and an assembly method thereof for simplifying the assembly procedure and improving the productibility.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTIONAn object of the present invention is to provide an optical sight with rangefinder capable of easily facilitating adjustment during assembling and the quality assurance procedure after assembled by way of simplifying the assembly procedure and improving the productibility thereof.
Another object of the present invention is to provide an assembly method of an optical sight with rangefinder capable of facilitating adjustment and the quality assurance procedure after assembled for reducing re-assembled procedures and improving the productibility thereof.
According above objects of the present invention, there is provided an optical sight with rangefinder comprising an erector lens unit, a photoelectric rangefinding unit, a barrel, an objective lens unit, a plurality of adjusting elements, a power supply unit and an eyepiece lens unit disposed on the barrel. The photoelectric rangefinding unit includes a laser emitter, a laser receiver and a range indicator. The photoelectric rangefinding unit is formed with a tunnel inside passed through therein for containing the erector lens unit. The barrel is a hollow barrel which is formed with a cavity passed through therein axially for containing the erector lens unit. A plurality of openings are formed on sidewall of the barrel corresponding to the positions of the laser emitter, laser receiver and range indicator for conducting the cavity to outside the barrel. The objective lens unit is disposed on one end of the barrel and the eyepiece lens unit is disposed on the other end of the barrel. The adjusting elements are disposed on the barrel corresponding the positions connected with the objective lens unit for adjusting the status of the objective lens unit.
The assembly method of the optical sight in accordance with the present invention comprises the steps below:
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- STEP 1: assembling the erector lens unit, the photoelectric rangefinding unit and the barrel formed with a plurality of openings, an objective lens unit and an adjusting element into a first assembly;
- STEP 2: adjusting the objective lens unit and the erector lens unit of said first assembly to meet the requirements of the parallax and the point of impact (POI) performances;
- STEP 3: adjusting the position of the reticle to reach the image plane of the objective lens unit or the image plane of erector lens unit and then fixing the position of the reticle;
- STEP 4: adjusting the focus of the laser emitter and the laser receiver and adjusting the position of the range indicator of the first assembly to meet the requirement of the photoelectric rangefinding performance;
- STEP 5: assembling the eyepiece lens unit to an end of the barrel of the first assembly;
- STEP 6: assembling the optical filtering unit to position in front of the objective lens unit;
- STEP 7: a quality test procedure will be implemented after aforementioned assembling steps. The quality test procedure includes an optical performance test, a photoelectric rangefinding performance test, an impact strength test and an air-sealing performance test. The assembling process will be returned to step 1 if any defect found in the quality test procedure;
- STEP 8: sealing the openings of the barrel by utilizing a plurality of sealing sheets thereby completing assembly of the optical sight with rangefinder.
In contrast to the prior art, the optical sight according to the present invention comprises the openings disposed on sidewall of the barrel corresponding to the positions of the laser emitter, laser receiver and the range indicator for easily facilitating the adjustment of each element. The optical sight according to the present invention is capable of preventing unnecessary disassemblies and re-assemblies for saving the total assembled time and reducing the number of defective products and the cost of production. The assembly method of the optical sight according to the present invention can be adjusted after all elements are assembled. The assembly method of the optical sight according to the present invention can be used to reduce the adjusting times and prevent unnecessary disassemblies and re-assemblies for simplifying the assembly process and improving the yield rate and the productibility of the laser sight.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGSThe present invention will be apparent to those skilled in the art by reading the following description of preferred embodiments thereof, with reference to the attached drawings, in which:
The present invention will now be described more specifically with reference to the following embodiments. It is to be noted that the following description of the preferred embodiments of the present invention are presented herein for purpose of illustration and description only and it is not intended to be exhaustive or to be limited to the precise form disclosed.
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- STEP 1: assembling the erector lens unit 1, the photoelectric rangefinding unit 2 and the barrel 3 with a plurality of openings 32, 33, 34, the objective lens unit 4 and the adjusting element 5 into a first assembly;
- STEP 2: adjusting the objective lens unit 4 and the erector lens unit 1 of said first assembly to meet the requirements of the parallax and the point of impact (POI) performances;
- STEP 3: adjusting the position of the reticle to reach the image plane of the objective lens unit 4 or the image plane of erector lens unit 1 and then fixing the position of the reticle;
- STEP 4: adjusting the focus of the laser emitter 21 and the laser receiver 22 and adjusting the position of the range indicator 23 of the first assembly to meet the requirement of the photoelectric rangefinding performance;
- STEP 5: assembling the eyepiece lens unit 8 to an end of the barrel of the first assembly;
- STEP 6: assembling the optical filtering unit 7 to position in front of the objective lens unit 4;
- STEP 7: a quality test procedure will be implemented after aforementioned assembling steps. The quality test procedure includes an optical performance test, a photoelectric rangefinding performance test, an impact strength test and an air-sealing performance test. The assembling process will be returned to step 1 if any defect found in the quality test procedure;
- STEP 8: sealing the openings 32, 33, 34 of the barrel 3 by utilizing a plurality of sealing sheets thereby completing assembly of the optical sight with rangefinder.
Following the above description, in step 4, the reticle is positioned at the image plane of the objective lens unit 4 or the image plane of the erector lens unit 1 (i.e. a first focus plane which the focus of the objective lens located in and a second focus plane which the focus of the erector lens unit located in). Generally speaking, the requirement of the parallax performance of the optical sight is that there is no parallax at 100 yards, and the requirement of the POI performance is 1 MOA (minute of angle), i.e. only a tolerance which below one inch can be allowed between the high magnification image and low magnification image at 100 yards. The adjustment of the photoelectric rangefinding performance is mostly implemented by adjusting the positions of the focus of the laser emitter 21 and laser receiver 22 and the range which the range indicator indicates. As shown in
As a result of that the opening 33, 32, 34 are disposed on sidewalls of the barrel 3 corresponding to the position of the laser emitter 21, laser receiver 22 and the range indicator 23, the adjustment of each element can be simplified to prevent unnecessary disassemblies and re-assemblies for saving the total assembled time and reducing the number of defective products and the cost of production. The assembly method of the optical sight according to the present invention can be adjusted after all elements are assembled. The assembly method of the optical sight according to the present invention can be used to reduce the adjusting times and prevent unnecessary disassemblies and re-assemblies for simplifying the assembly process and improving the yield rate and the productibility of the laser sight.
While the invention has been described in terms of what are presently considered to be the most practical and preferred embodiments, it is to be understood that the invention need not be limited to the disclosed embodiment. On the contrary, it is intended to cover various modifications and similar arrangements included within the spirit and scope of the appended claims, which are to be accorded with the broadest interpretation so as to encompass all such modifications and similar structures.
Claims
1. An optical sight with rangefinder, which comprises:
- a barrel defined with a cavity extended through therein axially;
- a photoelectric rangefinding unit disposed in the cavity of the barrel, having a laser emitter, a laser receiver and a range indicator, and defined with a tunnel;
- an erector lens unit disposed in the tunnel of the photoelectric rangefinding unit, having a reference mark for aiming;
- an objective lens unit disposed on one end of the barrel;
- an eyepiece lens unit disposed on the other end of the barrel;
- an adjusting element disposed on the outside surface of the barrel and extended into the barrel partially, corresponding to at least one of the objective lens unit, the photoelectric rangefinding unit and the erector lens unit thereby adjusting the relative positions of the objective lens unit, the photoelectric rangefinding unit and/or the erector lens unit; and
- a power supply unit disposed on the barrel, providing an electrical power to generate the rangefinding function;
- wherein the sidewall of the barrel is formed with a plurality of openings corresponding to the positions of the laser emitter, laser receiver and/or range indicator of the photoelectric rangefinding unit.
2. The optical sight with rangefinder as claimed in claim 1 wherein the photoelectric rangefinding unit comprises a reflecting prism collocating with the laser emitter, the laser receiver and the range indicator.
3. The optical sight with rangefinder as claimed in claim 2 wherein the reflecting prism includes a reflecting surface for reflecting a light with a predetermined wavelength and allowing other light with other wavelengths to pass.
4. The optical sight with rangefinder as claimed in claim 1 further comprising a reticle as the reference mark for aiming.
5. The optical sight with rangefinder as claimed in claim 4 wherein the reticle is positioned at one of the image plane of the objective lens unit and the image plane of the erector lens unit.
6. The optical sight with rangefinder as claimed in claim 5 wherein the emitting beam of the laser emitter is aligned with the center of the reticle.
7. The optical sight with rangefinder as claimed in claim 6 wherein the receiving beam of the laser receiver is aligned with the center of the reticle.
8. The optical sight with rangefinder as claimed in claim 1 wherein the range indicator projects an image on the image plane of the objective lens unit or the image plane of the erector lens unit.
9. The optical sight with rangefinder as claimed in claim 1 wherein the barrel comprises a plurality of sealing sheets utilized to seal the openings of the barrel after assembly and adjustment of the optical sight.
10. The optical sight with rangefinder as claimed in claim 1 further comprising an optical filter positioned in front of the objective lens unit.
11. A method for assembling an optical sight with rangefinder, comprising the steps of:
- assembling an erector lens unit, a photoelectric rangefinding unit, a barrel formed with a plurality of openings, an objective lens unit, and an adjusting element into a first assembly;
- adjusting the objective lens unit and the erector lens unit of the first assembly to meet the requirements of the parallax and the point of impact performances;
- adjusting any one of a laser emitter, a laser receiver and a range indicator of the photoelectric rangefinding unit to meet the requirement of the photoelectric rangefinding performance;
- assembling an eyepiece lens unit to an end of the barrel; and
- sealing the openings of the barrel thereby completing assembly of the optical sight with rangefinder.
12. The method for assembling an optical sight with rangefinder as claimed in claim 11, further comprising a step of adjusting the position of a reticle to reach the image plane of the objective lens unit or the image plane of erector lens unit and then fixing the reticle.
13. The method for assembling an optical sight with rangefinder as claimed in claim 12 wherein the requirement of the parallax performance is that there is no parallax at 100 yards, and the requirement of the point of impact performance is that the point of impact is lower than 1 MOA (minute of angle).
14. The method for assembling an optical sight with rangefinder as claimed in claim 12 wherein the adjustment of the laser emitter is implemented through a first opening of the barrel, to align the emitting beam of the laser emitter with the center of the reticle.
15. The method for assembling an optical sight with rangefinder as claimed in claim 12 wherein the adjustment of the laser receiver is implemented through a second opening of the barrel, to align the receiving beam of the laser receiver with the center of the reticle.
16. The method for assembling an optical sight with rangefinder as claimed in claim 11 wherein the adjustment of the range indicator is implemented through a third opening of the barrel, to adjust the position of the characters displayed by the range indicator.
17. The method for assembling an optical sight with rangefinder as claimed in claim 12, further comprising a step of mounting a power supply assembly on the barrel.
18. The method for assembling an optical sight with rangefinder as claimed in claim 17, further comprising a quality test procedure before assembling the optical sight, including an optical performance test, a photoelectric rangefinding performance test, an impact strength test and an air-sealing performance test.
19. The method for assembling an optical sight with rangefinder as claimed in claim 17, further comprising a step of assembling an optical filter to cover the objective lens unit.
20. An optical sight with rangefinder, comprising a barrel, a photoelectric rangefinding unit, an objective lens unit, an eyepiece lens unit and an adjusting elements wherein the barrel is a hollow barrel provided with a cavity extended through therein axially, the photoelectric rangefinding unit is assembled into the cavity of the barrel, a plurality of openings are formed on the sidewall of the barrel for adjusting the photoelectric rangefinding unit without disassembling the optical sight.
21. The optical sight with rangefinder as claimed in claim 20 wherein the barrel further comprises a plurality of sealing sheets utilized to seal the openings of the barrel after assembly and adjustment of the optical sight.
Type: Application
Filed: Jun 15, 2005
Publication Date: Jan 19, 2006
Applicant:
Inventors: Chen-Yeh Lin (Taichung), Shang-Yung Liang (Taichung)
Application Number: 11/152,205
International Classification: F41G 1/00 (20060101);