Patent ID: 8095328

Claim:
A monitoring system for a moving surface comprising: an emitter for emitting at least one light signal onto said moving surface; a collector for receiving at least one reflected representation of said at least one light signal; and electronics connected to said collector and configured to combine said at least one reflected representation into at least one waveform; said electronics further configured to derive and collect a plurality of sample points from said at least one waveform; said electronics further configured to derive a timing period from said collection of sample points when a sufficient number of said sample points have been collected; said electronics further configured to define a marker in said at least one waveform and generate an output signal that includes a representation of at least said marker, wherein said electronics comprise a microcomputer configuration including one or more central processing units, volatile memory, non-volatile memory, all interconnected by a bus to which a source respective to said emitter and said collector also connect.