All parts were initially positioned within 1 or 2 mm of the optimized position and all angles were within about 3 mrad. Sadly, that was not close enough to produce the desired results and many adjustments have been made during trial fabrications. A three axis mount was used to position the hybrid but the parabolic mirror gave us most of the alignment trouble. The final layout design using the Hybrid optic. We age it at room temp for 2 or 3 days prior to exposure so that it will harden and reconstruct with maximum clarity.
Most plates are clean and uniform and otherwise consistent and reproducible.
Processing is in standard IPA and water preceded by a 2 minute soak in Kodak fixer. An entirely new processing station was constructed for this project. About 50 gallons of IPA is now heated to 55 deg C with circulating hot water. The water is pumped through a remote gas water heater and stainless steel tubing looped in the bottom of each of three processing tanks, enabling economical and safe operation. Figure 5 below shows the process station and optics with mounts used during exposure.