I'm interested in a motorized version of VA100/M. I see that cdolbashian responded to Kevin Dean (on 2022-01-31 05:02:39.0) saying that there is a motorized version, but I cannot find a part number online. Can you point me towards that? Alternatively, is there any reason that a drop-in stepper motor (ZST206) would not work?

Hello, This item (VA100) is very close fulfilling a need that I have and is common in my field. The only issue is that the diameter of the aperture is too small. Ideally, an aperture that is >50 mm tall would be perfect for our (and many others') experiment(s). For example, often times our community generates 2 inch to 3 inch tall laser light sheets to facilitate planar imaging (say planar laser-induced fluorescence, planar Rayleigh Scattering imaging, etc.). Cutting down the as much forward scattered light as possible would greatly benefit such measurements. Thus, is it possible to produce an item similar to the VA100 only with the height/diameter of the aperture being >50 mm? (actually the ability to control the height would also be highly beneficial). Or does a product like this already exist? Thank you in advance for your time and assistance. Take care. Aaron

Let’s face it, pobody’s nerfect. We all make mistakes sometimes, even when we try to be cautious. Sometimes everything goes according to plan, sometimes we break stuff. These are good slits (there's no denying that), although when they’re (carelessly) closed beyond zero, the edge of the blades gets deformed. With a deformed edge the slit can’t be used to create a uniform diffraction pattern. The solution I propose is to make the blades replaceable. If you could make a VM100 variation that uses (the old style of) shaving razors as blades, if said slit was closed beyond its limits, it’d be possible to cheaply have a new edge without the need of replacing the whole device. If using shaving razors is not possible, would it be possible to make a slit that uses custom replaceable blades?

These are nice slits but it's a little annoying that there's only one 8-32 screw hole allowing a vertical slit and not one allowing a horizontal slit without a more complicated setup. Also, it's even more disappointing that the 30mm cage compatible VAC100C looks like it is just barely too large to fit if its 30mm cage is mounted inside of a 60mm cage. Based on the drawings, it looks like the top edge of the micrometer is about 27.5mm above the center while the bottom of the 6mm rails on the 60mm cage will be 27mm above the center. It seems that the standard, non-cage VA100 will fit because it's only 25.4mm above the center, but it will have to be mounted in a complicated way using the 8-32 screw.

Would be nice to have a cage compatible, motorized version.

When the slit is closed the micrometer is about 0.25 mm bellow the zero mark. It is possible readjust the micrometer perhaps with the lateral screws? Thank you very much in advance.

Hello. I am using your VA100 mechanical slit. It works very well! however, I would like to get feedback from you: Does the screw lecture equal to the slit width?. I performed a diffraction experiment (the diffraction of a single slit into the Fraunhofer approx) to get the width of the slit and my experiment shows that actually, the slit separation is a half of the screw lecture. Am I right?. Best regards! P.D.: I agree with the comments below. It would be very useful to have furthermore a rectangular 2D slit mechanism.

I would like to know if you also sell a motorized version of the adjustable slit. Or if it is possible to buy it without the micrometerhead and install an acctuator myself.

I have two of your variable slits #VA100. They work well but I am burning the SS slits with my 230mw laser. I have to reset the position of the slit after about 30 minutes of exposure with the laser or an average of 2-3 days. While in use the beam changes fringes as it burns the edge of the slit. Can you make the slit parts in Molybdenum so they don't melt and also make the edge thinner then the present 100um, say around 10um.The whole slit blade can be made thinner. The Moly has a melting point of 2610 degrees C. SS melts at about 1440 degrees C. Thanks for your help in this product improvement. Paul Sciortino Senior Engineer Polarization Solutions, LLC

I would like to know if you are going to make an adjustable slit made out of thinner harder material such as moly. I have a DUV laser and I am using your product VA100. The problem is that the SS slit is too thick and also melts very easily after the beam has passed through the slit for about 30 minutes(accumulated time). Thanks for any help in regard to this matter.

Can I have a slit having movements both in the vertical and horizontal direction?

Would it be possible to change the design of the mechanical slot so that it could be opened all the way to have a 0.5" (12.7 mm) free aperture? Or is it possible to change the micrometer screw to open the slit further? A slit that can be opened up to 10 or 12 mm would be very useful for us!

Response from Tim at Thorlabs: Thank you for your feedback! I agree this would be a very useful feature. Right now, our design engineers are working on a lot of new ideas, many of them which have been customer feedback. One of our most exciting projects is a new integrated optomech family and one of the new design ideas is a calibrated slit. We certainly hear your feedback for a cage mountable system and we appreciate you sharing your feedback so that we can incorporate them into our upcoming designs.

Make cage system compatible.

Response from Tim at Thorlabs: Thank you for your interest in our VA100! Reviewing the design, there is no reason for any performance difference when mounting vertically or horizontally.

How stable is this design if I mount the slits horizontally? Will there be much creep over time?

A response from Adam at Thorlabs: Due to the current design of the VA100, it is not possible to add stepper motors to this product. The main body is only 0.380" thick so the hole cannot be opened up to 0.375" to accommodate the 3/8" barrel of the ZST6B. I believe that this is a good new product idea and will suggest this to our opto-mechanical engineering team as a customer-inspired idea.

is it possible to have this motorized using one of your 1/4-80 stepper motors?

According to an estimate made by Thorlabs Technical Support Staff, the distance between the sets of slits would be ~4.36 mm. Thank-you for the interest in our product and please contact us if you have any further questions.

Hello, How far from the face are the blades in the VS100? I need two adjustable slits - one x and one y - as close to the same plane as possible. If the removable plate from two VS100 were removed and the two parts placed right against each other, how close would the two sets of blades be? Thanks Steve Clarke Los Alamos National Lab

Tried to find this page by searching on adjustable slit, then variable slit, then i used slit but then had to guess that mechanical slit was the right choice in the large number of options given in response to the last query. The reason why i wanted to find the product page was to understand the minimum slit width, the presentation says fully closed, could you clarify what you mean by this less than precise term.