When people ask “so, what is optics all about?”.  It is often hard to give a short answer because our small Optics team based in Derby must be one of the most diverse within Scientifics.

In recent years Scientifics have tested railway signals, road traffic signals, car headlamps and bulbs, CD racks, glow sticks, insect zappers and even glass blocks for use in prison cells!  Putting all those different samples into one category is difficult, but basically we test systems which produce or utilise light.

Coming from a railway background, our expertise has traditionally been in railway signalling.  Apart from testing new LED technologies for various signal manufacturers as part of their research and development process, the Optics Team conducts routine quality assurance testing for the railway industry.  Every single glass signal lens to be used on the UK rail network is tested by the Optics Team here at Scientifics and five percent of every batch of signal lamps are tested.

We are always keen to move into new markets and in recent years have been conducting more and more testing in the road traffic industry.  LED traffic light signals, car headlamps, bicycle lamps, pedestrian crossing indicators and car accessories such as LED washer and number plate lights are all examples of items tested by the Optics Team in recent years.  One interesting job was to test the effectiveness of car headlight “beam adaptors” of the sort which are required to be used by law if you take a UK car on the continent.  “Before” and “after” beam profiles were produced for various car headlights including the VW Golf, Mercedes CLK and Peugeot 307.

Hopefully the next new market for the Optics Team will be the LRV (light reflectance value) testing of vehicle and building interiors.  Recent government legislation such as the Rail Vehicle Accessibility Regulations and the Building Regulations 2000 Approved Document AD(M)2004 have been introduced so that the visual contrast between adjacent areas of a vehicle or building (such as a door handle and it’s background) can be adequately distinguished by visually impaired people.  This is potentially a large and exciting market to get into as every new building and vehicle must adhere to the new legislation.

So, if you have any customers you feel could use our optical testing facilities, please feel free to pass on their enquiries and we will do our best to help.