Beam splitting target reflector based compensation for angular drift of laser beam in laser autocollimation of measuring small angle deviations.

Beam splitting target reflector based compensation for the angular drift of laser beam in laser autocollimation is proposed in this article to improve the measurement accuracy and stability of small angle deviations. A beam splitting target reflector is used to replace the plane mirror in laser autocollimation to generate a reference beam when returning the measurement beam. The reference beam and measurement beam have the same angular drift, but have different sensitivities to the rotation angle of the reflector due to the unique characteristics of the reflector. Thus, the angular drift of laser beam in laser autocollimation can be compensated in real time by using the drift of reference beam. Experimental results indicate that an output stability of 0.085 arc sec in 2 h can be achieved after compensation. And a measurement accuracy of ±0.032 arc sec can be obtained over the range of ±1190 arc sec with an effective resolution of 0.006 arc sec. It is confirmed that the compensation method for the angular drift of laser beam is necessary for improving the measurement accuracy and stability in laser autocollimation.