A laser beam power adjustment system control and automation

摘要

This work deals with the study and implementation of a laser beam power adjustment system. Previously, the power adjustment system was done manually through the rotation of a disk with gradual attenuation of its transmission. Besides this process, the positioning of the power sensor were also manually executed. Stepper motors, the PIC16F877A microcontroller and the software Labview were chosen for the automation of the adjustment system. The implemented solution made use of the program developed in Labview as master system controller. The PIC was configured as a slave for the command execution of the peripherals and motors. The stepper motors (connected to the PIC's board) are responsible for the positioning of the power sensor and the attenuating disk's rotation. All system's functions were individually tested and later the entire system fully tested at the laser's bench. The TCP/IP communication protocol with a three-dimensional positioning system was tuned. The project delivered a fully functional adjustment system to the Photonics Laboratory.