High resolution optical sensor for the inspection of engine cylinder walls

The inspection of an engine cylinder wall is an important industrial applic ation for optical sensors. This task is an example, where a 3-D characteriz ation of the microstructure is needed to obtain a full functional surface d escription. Recently several approaches have been made to solve this proble m. In this paper a short comparison about the different approaches is given and a new highly resolving sensor is presented. This sensor enables a spat ial resolution of 1 mum, a vertical resolution of up to 1 mum, and is reali zed in a very compact housing. Measurements are given which demonstrate the progress in this application field.