Amber/Raytheon Triple Field of View (TFOV 60/180/500 mm) Lens

[MrSheep]

I recently acquired this extremely rare TFOV Lens. I have only seen it in brochures and I am happy to have it in real life now haha. More info to come.

[MrSheep]

Here are some pics of the Internals. A very interesting design. The fixed lenses rotate on the inside and are controlled by a controller, mini stepper motors, hall-effect sensors, and a very unique gearing/clutch system. I put some tape over the coverings while I work to minimize dust getting inside.

[MrSheep]

Here are the electronics. There is a DC to DC converter that is 24V to 24V prob just for isolation purposes. I looked up the part (which is obsolete now) and this part alone $300!

The lens is controlled by one control board here. I will be analyzing it to see how to control the lens. So far the lens DB9 port only wires to the RS232 MAX chip. And Wires to the 24V DC to DC converter.

Has anyone heard of Optimum Optical Systems? Maybe they can chime in on how this lens is controlled.

[MrSheep]

Here is an image of the lens from the phoenix brochure I found on the wayback machine on "www.flirthermography.com" https://web.archive.org/web/20060516074340/http://www.flirthermography.com/cameras/all_cameras.asp

This lens was also in the Merlin and Radiance HS brochures:

https://web.archive.org/web/19990429060018/http://www.amber-infrared.com/products/radianceHS.html

The photo attached with the red chart mentions the DFOV and TFOV lenses under the Radiance HS product description. Cool to see how this lens ended up in the Merlin and Phoenix brochures.

Here is also a link to a mention of this lens on the merlin accessories page on indigo-systems old website:
https://web.archive.org/web/20040603074145/http://www.indigosystems.com/product/merlin_options.html

Phoenix Accessories Page:
https://web.archive.org/web/20040603025902/http://www.indigosystems.com/product/phoenix_specs.html

[MrSheep]

To get this lens working it looks like I have to reverse engineer the firmware. (Unless someone knows how this lens works)

The chips below are of interest to me. Attached is the data-sheet for the MCU and EEPROM (I think?)

[IR_Geek]

Wow that is an excellent find to go with your Amber cameras.    Noticed the electronics board had a SN of -001.   May not be many of those lenses "in the wild".   However the model number on the lens front says Rev C.    Very interesting indeed.    One of your screen captures from the brochures says it's an F/4 and not an F/2.3     While it will work, you will have to bump your integration time up to overcome the signal loss and build a specific NUC table for each focal length to get best image quality.   Easy enough with the cooled Ambers's and RTools.

Look forward to seeing some imagery from that monster.

[MrSheep]

Thank you for this. I always wondered what were the negative affects of using mismatched F Numbers. Now I know that you need to increase integration time to account for the loss of "photon energy" due to the higher F number. Now my question is how much do I have to do this. Is there a specific formula I should follow or is it just until you get a good image.

And will do! I have to first figure out how to get the lens to respond to commands. I wonder if FLIR has as user manual for it somewhere in their archives as it was once an Indigo product back in 2005. I think from 2005 to 2006 they switched to the SC6000 series cameras and the merlin and phoenix cameras were no longer offered. Check out the two brochures.

[IR_Geek]

It really depends on the responsivity of the system, but generally speaking a F/4 captures about 1/2 of the energy as a F/2.8    See diagram. 


With the Amber have a cold stop of F/2.3  it will be a little less.   That of course assumes equal transmission through the lens.     Good rule of thumb is look at a scene or blackbody of the temperature you are looking for and watch the digital counts till they are about half way between cold or hot saturation.  The Amber's are 12 bit (4095), so about 2048 counts.     

One of the great things about cooled cameras is the adjustability ... also one of the biggest downsides too!    Guess that's why most people prefer the uncooled 'turn key' cameras.

If FLIR carried them forward then there is a good chance they had the software.  Key would be if it's still around or can be found.    I know my organization upgraded cameras - Amber, Indigo, FLIR - and kept lenses.    My work still has shelves of older lenses that we utilize with newer cameras.    It's amazing to see 30+ year old IR lenses used with state of the art focal planes.

[MrSheep]

Wow this is great information indeed. I am still learning when it comes to this stuff. It wasn't until a few months ago that I finally learned about integration time. I guess since as you stated normal uncooled cameras don't really care about that stuff since it is fixed and can't be changed.

One cool thing I figured out is that a Pleora PT1000 LVDS can be used with ResearchIR. Shame you cant do custom cameras on the newer FLIR Research Studio Software. Which is why I have both. Luckily any recordings you do on research ir you can just transfer to research studio most of the time.

The cool the about the Pleora module is that you can use convert RS422 signals to LVDS via a bunch of resistors to attenuate the signal to LVDS levels. I already was able to do this with an Indigo Merlin camera which is 12-Bit RS-422. So in theory I can do this with the amber camera as well.

(Please excuse the un-NUC'd image was just for testing purposes haha)

As for the software I hope they did too. I will ask if they even know about these lenses haha. Might have to send them some brochures to jog their memory. Maybe some engineer still knows about it.

[Fraser]

Regarding asking FLIR for technical information on obsolete cooled cameras……

I have spoken to FLIR USA about cooled cameras, some of which were actual FLIR products rather than Amber or Indigo Systems. I found that the USA support team only knew about very recent FLIR models and they even admitted that none of their team or USA based techs knew anything about the SC4000 and SC6000 ! They had not even seen one ! I suspect staff “churn” may be responsible for this situation and older “sages” have left the company. Fortunately FLIR USA CS forwarded my enquiry to FLIR, PARIS (France) where the scientific thermal camera division is now located. I spoke with an amazing chap who was clearly an expert on cooled science cameras of all ages. It turned out that he was the Chief of that divisions technical team ! He loved to discuss all things scientific thermal camera related and was very helpful. He sought out the information and obsolete software that I needed amongst his team and could not have been more helpful. It was a classic direct Technical Officer to Technical Officer interaction rather than via a customer services representative. This is what you need with these cooled cameras as, even within FLIR, they are a specialist product with only limited knowledge within the USA based customer support team. There may be older technical officers within FLIR USA who would have information or knowledge, but they can be hard to track down via FLIR CS.

In my personal experience it has been apparent that if the legacy information you seek is not within the excellent on-line FLIR archives, it is unlikely that FLIR USA customer support will be able to help. It appears that they do not have “off-line” archives that may be searched for obsolete equipment data and software. In the past I have been put in touch with members of FLIR USA management (a CEO no less) who tasked their subordinate teams with searching old PC’s for copies of obsolete software to send to me ! That may all have changed with the move to Teledyne as such is going beyond normal customer support limits.

I suggest that a call for support be raised with FLIR USA requesting information on the TFOV lens and suggesting forwarding the request to the FLIR PARIS scientific camera team. That way you may avoid the classic “sorry that is obsolete and we no longer hold data on it” response.

Fraser

[IR_Geek]

Ditto on what Fraser said.   FLIR can be complicated to find the correct person.  They have absorbed so much over the past 20+ years and there has been lots of churn.

the pleora stuff is good.  Could have sworn they had an RS422 version but can't find it.  maybe it was another company or converting to CameraLink.    To me, working with these scientific cameras are much more interesting than the 'pretty picture' uncooled systems. 

I need to gather my stuff together with pictures as I have several blackbodies, lenses, two Merlin Uncooled, a TAU2, an Omega, Radiance 1 shell, and several other items.

[MrSheep]

yes good point haha. I have been given that "This product is obsolete response" many times before. It was usually when I asked about the SC6000. I will ask to be forwarded to the Paris division.

IR_Geek yes. There was a RS-422 version of pleora but it is impossible to find. (I've looked forever. haha). So instead of waiting for it to pop up. I took it into my own hands and found out that the LVDS could work due to very similar chips internally. Then I found this article that confirmed my suspicions. I took each of the data and valid pins and attenuated them with resistors. Checked the voltages and tested it with my merlin camera. And it works! Was very happy it did since it was a breakthrough. Never would I have thought I would get older Merlin cameras to work with such a modern software like ResearchIR. And now I think the Amber cameras have a chance of working as well.

[MrSheep]

Just an update on this. I haven't had any luck with FLIR US or Paris side. Wish they still kept everything on their servers . I'd imagine most of these indigo products and manuals sitting on a shelf or desk somewhere collecting dust. Most will see them as junk but to us it is gold haha.

[MrSheep]

Still doing some research about this lens. Apparently Optimum Optical Solutions was acquired by FLIR:
https://www.vision-systems.com/non-factory/article/16749435/teledyne-acquires-optimum-optical-strengthens-tactical-ir-imaging-systems

So using our trusty wayback machine I found some documentation on the TFOV!
https://web.archive.org/web/20100308014912/http://www.optimumopticalsystems.com/Products.aspx?categoryid=427d08fa-674e-4eda-874b-b3eb40796c95

As well as some specs on an earlier Continuous zoom lens:
https://web.archive.org/web/20040805111054/http://optimumopticalsystems.com/flir.htm

What is nice is it looks like the continuous zoom lens uses standard RS232 settings, which can help in figuring out the commands for my TFOV

[bCubed]

The TFOV is amazing!  But I want to comment on using the Pleora PT1000-LV to interface to RS422 outputs.  Several times I have interfaced cameras using the PT1000-LV644-GEV-E interface to convert RS422 to GigE.  I didn't use resistors to attenuate the signals because the output from the RS422 is compatible with the input of the PT1000-LV644.  You might need resistors if you go the other way around, but if you only care about the outputs from the camera, then you have only to make a connector to get it operational.  I'm in the process of doing this now to my Galileo, but have done it successfully with a couple of Santa Barbara Focalplane cameras.

[MrSheep]

The TFOV is amazing!  But I want to comment on using the Pleora PT1000-LV to interface to RS422 outputs.  Several times I have interfaced cameras using the PT1000-LV644-GEV-E interface to convert RS422 to GigE.  I didn't use resistors to attenuate the signals because the output from the RS422 is compatible with the input of the PT1000-LV644.  You might need resistors if you go the other way around, but if you only care about the outputs from the camera, then you have only to make a connector to get it operational.  I'm in the process of doing this now to my Galileo, but have done it successfully with a couple of Santa Barbara Focalplane cameras.

Yeah I am going to try interfacing without the resistors. Hopefully nothing bad happens haha. Luckily the signals are from the camera to the Pleora. So if anything the Pleora would be the only one that would be damaged. Not the end of the world since they are pretty cheap and still available.

[MrSheep]

ok so I decided to dive a little deeper into extracting the firmware from this device. The TN87C51FA1 microcontroller looks like it is of the MCS-51 family and is a variant of the 8051. This microcontroller has 4Kb of EEPROM on it, so I am guessing this is where the firmware lies. I have the T84 universal programmer coming in the mail: https://xgecu.myshopify.com/collections/xgecu-t48-tl866ii-3g-programmer. I plan to test this with a blank chip first to see if it reads it properly. Once I know that the universal programmer works with my MCU I will move onto reading the actual chip.

The board also has a Xicor X24C04 4Kb EEPROM on it as well. So my question is does anyone have a guess as to what the EEPROM is for? The unit connects to a few magnetic sensors as well as an encoder on the focus motor. Would the EEPROM be responsible for the position information?

[MrSheep]

Made some more progress on this. I added a PLCC44 Socket to the board. Now I can remove the chip safely and read the chip. What I can try now is read whatever is on there and dump the firmware to another blank chip. Hopefully this will work as it will allow me to save a backup copy as well as experiment with the other chip without needing to mess around with the original. one.

After installing the new socket and putting back the original chip I tested the lens again by applying 24V. And to my relief the lens did it's boot up and homing sequence. Good to know the socket install was a success. I had to apply a lot of flux from a flux syringe as well as Chip-Quik. The chip would not budge at first then I remembered the board was potted. So I lifted one corner gently with a pick tool and one corner lifted all while the Chip-Quik kept everything molten. I worked my way around the chip not applying to much pressure and making sure the side I was working on was fully molten.

After the chip was removed I used flux and desoldering braid to remove all the excess solder from the pads as well as the pins. And after a lot of alcohol swaps and wipes to clean up the flux, I made sure there were no bridges using a magnifying lamp. I also used the pick tool again to make sure the solder joins were good and I didn't miss a pin.

A note on the middle part of the PLCC44 socket: The middle part comes attached from factory but I learned a trick on YouTube where you carefully snip off the legs so u can more easily reach the legs to solder the socket. I placed it back in after the job so it acts as a shim for the chip to make sure the chip doesn't go too deep into the socket.

[MrSheep]

I managed to read the chip! With the beep tone of my programmer and the success message, this indicated I was able to fully read the chip's firmware. I have attached the firmware in intel hex (.hex) and binary format (.bin).

You need to remove the .txt extension to get the original file.

You have to upload it to the program here. https://xgecu.myshopify.com/collections/xgecu-t48-tl866ii-3g-programmer
I tried to copy the ascii from the xprog program but couldn't. (I will try to figure out a way)

But here is a screen shot in the meantime. Some of the text is readable

Hopefully with enough reconstructing I can figure out how to connect to it via RS232

[MrSheep]

I managed to go another route. I parsed the Intel hex and got rid of all the extra bits such as address checksum etc:

(I attached the intel hex parsed and the intel hex with only the data portion)

Below is what the formatting of the parsed intel is:


Each line must have the format ":LLAAAATT<data>SS"
Where:
 1st char is a colon
 Everything afterward are 2-hex-char (high-nibble/low-nibble) representations of bytes, eg. "12"==0x12
 Those bytes are:
    LL is the length
    AAAA is the address
    TT is the record type
    <data> is 'LL' of data bytes
    SS is the checksum



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OSS/MOSS Controller Rev -  Firmware Version 1.10
Copyright (c) 1996-1997 Optimum Optical Systems
Command List:            Error Messages:
FN   Command Narrow FOV      FE   FOV Error
FM   Command Middle FOV      PE   Focus Error
FW   Command Wide FOV      ERR   Command Error
FI   Initialize FOV         CKE   Checksum Error
FS   Request FOV Status
Pnnnn   Focus Command
+/-   Focus Jog
PS   Request Focus Status
SF   Front Temperature Sensor
SR   Rear Temperature Sensor
MN   Activate Mechanism
MO   Deactivate Mechanism
MS   Request Mechanism Status
LUnnnn   Store Upper Focus Limit
LLnnnn   Store Lower Focus Limit
LS   Request Limit Status
OS   Request Optics Status
X   Transmit 20 bytes to Optics
R   Receive 20 bytes from Optics
W   Store 20 bytes in Optics
SFSR0000
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CKE
MN
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W
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Making great progress

[MrSheep]

The garbled text is prob just the program's assembly code but what is most interesting is this part. (And wow 1996-1997 ) :

LULL
Password: OK
OSS/MOSS Controller Rev -  Firmware Version 1.10
Copyright (c) 1996-1997 Optimum Optical Systems
Command List:            Error Messages:
FN   Command Narrow FOV      FE   FOV Error
FM   Command Middle FOV      PE   Focus Error
FW   Command Wide FOV      ERR   Command Error
FI   Initialize FOV         CKE   Checksum Error
FS   Request FOV Status
Pnnnn   Focus Command
+/-   Focus Jog
PS   Request Focus Status
SF   Front Temperature Sensor
SR   Rear Temperature Sensor
MN   Activate Mechanism
MO   Deactivate Mechanism
MS   Request Mechanism Status
LUnnnn   Store Upper Focus Limit
LLnnnn   Store Lower Focus Limit
LS   Request Limit Status
OS   Request Optics Status
X   Transmit 20 bytes to Optics
R   Receive 20 bytes from Optics
W   Store 20 bytes in Optics
SFSR0000
FW
X
CKE
MN
MO
W
ERR - PE
FN
FM
ME

[Fraser]

I was just looking through a file that is supplied with the Amber UserMenu 3 program. It would appear that there is lens control functionality within UserMenu and the ICD file mentions a triple field of view lens  I am still working my way around the UserMenu files so cannot comment further on any lens control functionality. Take a look at the attached file in a text editor like Notepad and the ICD makes interesting reading.

Update: I just checked the menu creation files and I can see menu entries for controlling both the DFV and TFV lenses 

Fraser

[MrSheep]

Oh wow!!! You are correct:

>>;=======================================================================
>>; Menu 18 - TFV Lens
>>;=======================================================================

>>Function:
        TFV Lens Control
>>FunctionName:
   TFVLens
>>SelectionLetters:
   TF
>>MenuName:
   Lens
>>Description:
   Functions for use with the Tri-field of view lens

  Thanks for this great find. Will do more research myself, as well!

[Fraser]

The files associated with the UserMenu program are making interesting reading. I am hoping that there may be instruction entries that may be changed so that the software works with my Radiance 1 camera. In the GALPRC.MNU file I am seeing various codes and function numbers associated with commands. More investigation needed. I need to prove to myself that the communications test timeout is not a hardware issue as the ICD suggests that the link test uses no data packets.

Fraser

[MrSheep]

Yeah im going to have to do some deep diving myself. I am going to use a serial monitoring program and see what the reads and writes are.
I dont think these cameras respond in normal ASCII since most functions when using RTools' programs are seen in Hex commands.

The attached doc is from someone who owned a Galileo camera as well. He was able to decipher some of the command structure. I believe the Radiance 1 is the same just using different reserved commands.

In the text file left hex is prob the "write to camera" and the right is the response from camera.

(Write) 03 00 0A 02 00 24 FF FF 00 00 31 02 00 00   (Read)03 00 0A 02 00 24 00 00 00 00 33 00 00 00    //  AGC ON