Spectrometer Calibration Services at Avantes US

Posted on: March 25th, 2020

Avantes US Expands Wavelength Calibration Service

Avantes US is excited to announce the expansion of our Calibration Lab capabilities. Our new Wavelength calibration system allows wavelength calibration for any range between 200-1100 nm. This proprietary multichannel system includes Mercury-Argon, Argon, Zinc, Cadmium spectral calibration sources, and DHc and Halogen test sources. To perform the calibrations, a special AvaSoft version that communicates with the AvaSpec EEPROM and enables our Engineers to apply 2nd order peaks calibration data. This allows the Colorado office to perform nearly all wavelength calibrations locally at the North American headquarters.

While all Avantes AvaSpec spectrometers are wavelength calibrated at our factory and this calibration is stored permanently onboard the EEPROM of all AvaSpec instruments, and since Avantes instruments are robustly designed with fixed optics and slits, recalibration of our instruments is typically not required. Nevertheless, customers with heavy-use application cases that involve frequent movement (such as handheld applications), or extreme conditions, may choose periodic recalibration. In other examples, customers needing to comply with internal procedures for quality assurance may prefer to have their instruments re-calibrated at regular intervals to document performance standards. Avantes Spectral-CAL-Service is an affordable option to facilitate this. Avantes USA can perform this calibration in as little as 1-2 business days.

Intensity or Irradiance Calibration

Applications such as optical emission spectroscopy and radiometry require that the optical chain from the sample interface (integrating sphere, collimator, fiber or cosine corrector) to the detector be calibrated for intensity or irradiance.  Such calibrations are performed in our specialized lab using a vibrational isolation table, stabilized power supply, and NIST traceable light source.  Instruments designed for the visible to near-infrared (360-2500 nm) are typically calibrated with a quartz tungsten halogen source and instruments that are designed for the ultraviolet (200-400 nm) are calibration with a deuterium source.  Avantes offers the IRRAD-CAL-UV (200-400 nm), IRRAD-CAL-VIS (360-1100 nm), IRRAD-CAL-UV/ViS (200-1100 nm) and IRRAD-CAL-NIR (1000-2500 nm) calibration services for our customers that require irradiance or intensity calibration.  Irradiance calibrations are performed on specific configurations with collection optics such as integrating spheres, cosine corrector that provides for the sampling of radiant sources at a known surface area.  These calibrations are referred to as absolute calibrations and they are directly traceable to NIST within certain uncertainty specifications.  Intensity calibrations are typically performed on fibers, probes, and collimators in order to provide for inter-instrument agreement over a population of spectrometers.  Intensity calibrations are considered relative calibrations though they are performed using the same reference lamps as are used for the irradiance calibrations.  Intensity calibrations are roughly traceable to NIST but are subject to greater uncertainties due to the characteristics of the sampling accessories used.  Nearly all intensity and irradiance calibration services begin with a non-linearity calibration of the spectrometer.  Irradiance and intensity calibration services require the spectrometer, fiber, and sampling optics all be included in the calibration since each component contributes variability to the calibration.  Avantes USA can perform the visible and near infra-red calibrations in as little as 1-2 business days for the 360-2500 nm wavelength ranges.  Specialized configurations and all ultraviolet calibration require a return to our factory calibration lab and in these cases, the calibration can be performed in as little as 5-7 business days.

Non-linearity Calibration

Certain applications such as radiometry demand exceptional linearity of detector response.  Linearity refers to the correlation between a detector’s response and changes in the light intensity or integration time.  Some detectors such as the 2048L detector contained in the AvaSpec-ULS2048L-USB2 require a specialized calibration to correct for non-linearities inherent to the detector.  The NL-calibration service is available from Avantes to correct for detector non-linearities.  Avantes USA can perform this calibration in as little as 1-2 business days.  This service is included as a standard part of all intensity/irradiance calibrations (see below) provided by Avantes.

Avantes, the Spectroscopy Partner you Can Trust

Avantes is an ISO 9001:2008 certified developer and manufacturer of fiber-coupled spectrometers and fiber optic devices. We have twenty years of experience with thousands of happy customers around the world. We are dedicated to our customer’s success and stand by our products with a full three-year limited warranty on our instruments. You can feel confident trusting your annual and ad hoc spectrometer calibrations to the team you trust to build it.

For more information about Avantes calibration services, please contact a sales engineer at [email protected] or 1-866-678-4248.

Avantes Demo Program

Avantes continues to offer an extensive demo program for onsite feasibility testing. Contact your sales engineer today to inquire.