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FAQs

Your questions answered

We use a trusted agent, UPS, to supply all our additional documentation and utilize their experience worldwide to ensure we minimize any delays that may be caused by a lack of the correct documentation.

Not a great deal but please ensure you have given us your EORI number as forwarders can refuse to take shipments without one. It needs to be quoted on all documentation or there will inevitably be delays.

Inevitably there have been delays in exports of our goods which have been beyond our control. However, we endeavor to do whatever we can to minimize this delay, and hopefully, things are beginning to improve now that everyone is getting used to the new systems and controls.

For any small orders of our standard stock parts, we encourage you to use our website to place an order and make payment.
This is a much easier procedure and processing these types of orders internally uses essential resources.
For this reason we have a minimum order value of $600/£550/€550 that we use for accepting POs.

If you have purchased an optical component that has an AR coating on one side, you may be wondering how to identify which side is which.

  • Method 1

You will need to set up the component, tilted slightly down and away from you, with the reflection of a light source that is extending beyond the furthest edge of the part from you eye.

If you have a strong reflection that goes to the edge, the uncoated side is facing up.

If the reflection broken just before the edge, the coated side is facing up. What you are seeing in this scenario is the reflection from the bottom, uncoated, surface.

It is not uncommon for AR coatings to have a colouration to them. Often when the coated side is facing up, the reflection changes colour at the edge.

 

  • Method 2

This technique can be a little more difficult to identify the coating, but particularly useful if the optical component is very thin or has a large chamfer.

Using the same setup as above, you will need to cast a shadow on the top surface.
You can use an object, such as a pencil, you can cast a shadow through the reflection of a light source.
Creating a shadow on the coated side would result in a ghost shadow being cast underneath the normal shadow: if this was to occur on the uncoated side, the ghost shadow would appear above the normal shadow.
The ghost shadow will often appear coloured, depending on the type of AR coating.