Patent ID: 6865022
Filing Date: 2005-03-08
Classification: F41G,G02B

Abstract:
1. An improved optical instrument for alignment with an object of interest, comprising: a) a housing, b) an objective lens mounted in said housing at one end thereof for forming an image of said object of interest; c) an ocular lens mounted in said housing at the opposite end thereof, wherein said objective and said ocular lenses define an optical axis through said housing d) image-erecting optics mounted between said objective lens and said ocular lens on said optical axis for erecting said image formed by said objective ions, said image-erecting optics and said ocular lens sharing a plane of focus on said optical axis where said erected image is formed for viewing by an operator; e) a reticle mounted within said housing on said plane of focus, said reticle having at least one primary indicator on said optical axis, an image thereof being viewable together with said image of said object of interest formed by said objective lens and said image-erecting optics within said housing to facilitate alignment of said optical instrument with said object; and, f) at least one secondary indicator carried by said reticle, axially-centered with regard to said primary indicator and spaced-apart therefrom on said optical axis for forming a composite image with said image of said primary indicator, said composite image and said object image being viewable together by an operator by means of said ocular lens; whereby said images of said primary and said secondary indicators are aligned by an operator to eliminate parallax error relative to said image of said object to assure accurate alignment of said optical axis of said optical instrument with said object.