Design of a calibration system for 1D measuring probes

High precision linear displacement probes are currently on the market and are used in various applications where the knowledge of the position with submicron accuracy is necessary. In the corresponding literature little information can be found about the calibration of these probes. The paper gives an overview of calibration systems designed the calibration of probes with resolution in the nanometer range. A facility has been developed to calibrate both analogue and digital probes to an accuracy of 0,05 μm. A single axis translation stage moves the tip of the probe touching the face of flat mirror with flatness better than λ/100. The displacement and the change of the angular position of the stage is determined by a plane mirror laser interferometer and angular sensors. The displacement indicated by the probe is compared with the displacement measured by the interferometer. The error of the probe is the difference between the two corrected by using the values of the angular deviation and the environmental parameters as temperature, are then calculated. The working range is 100 mm. The design considerations and the measuring uncertainty are discussed and results are given to demonstrate systems performance.