The impact of instrument engineering parameters on spectral reproducibility across filter instruments

This paper explores the role of instrument engineering parameters in master -slave optical differences. Engineering parameters with significant (p = 0. 05) impact were classified into three groups according to the magnitude of their influence (analysis of variance mean squares) on optical differences. The only parameter with high influence was preamplifier gain. Filter area, filter bandwidth, detector temperature, idle filter wheel temperature, sam ple temperature and optics unit differences exerted medium impact. There we re seven properties with low but still significant impact. Software was dev eloped to aid users and manufacturers in selecting optical standardisation and in diagnosing instrument differences.