Custom IR mirrors, lenses, windows, and assemblies in sapphire, silicon, germanium, chalcogenides, zinc selenide, BaF₂, CaF₂, and spinel.
IRD Ceramics performs IR fabrication in house, which is what allows low-cost commercial mirrors and controlled defense work to run on the same floor. Send the requirement and the technical team reviews fabrication, coating, assembly, and inspection as one route before quoting — free of charge on a new design.
Transmission band matters, but so do mounting, thermal behavior, weight, coating, assembly, and how the finished optic will be inspected.
What IRD Ceramics builds for infrared cameras and sensors — commercial parts and controlled defense parts come off the same floor.
Protective and transmitting apertures for infrared cameras, sensors, and detection systems, including sapphire and spinel where the environment is abrasive or hot as well as optically demanding.
Simple and complex custom IR lens geometry fabricated and assembled around the system requirement, with quick prototype turnaround and CAD/CAM support.
Silicon and other IR mirror substrates polished and coated for commercial and controlled applications, from low-cost volume mirrors up to laser-quality parts.
Example: 2″ silicon mirror held better than 1/2 wave flatness
Simple and complex lens assemblies, IR coating, packaging, and point-of-use preparation, developed with the customer's process rather than handed over at the component boundary.
Infrared substrates behave nothing like optical glass. Choosing one commits the program to a machining route, a polishing route, a coating chemistry, and a mounting scheme all at once.
Spinel is a durable polycrystalline transparent ceramic with optical transparency from the near ultraviolet through the mid-wave infrared. Sapphire transmits from UV into the mid-infrared while resisting heat, chemical attack, and abrasion — which is what puts both into windows that also have to survive their environment.
Silicon holds its mechanical strength and shock resistance to around 1,400 °C and is used in aerospace for its chemical corrosion resistance compared with other hard ceramics. It is fabricated with hard-material tooling and slurries, on the same equipment set as IRD's technical ceramics work.
IRD offers low- and high-volume production, design assistance, CAD/CAM support, simple and complex lens assemblies, IR coating, and quick prototype turnaround. Integrating those operations with the customer's is what produces fewer parts and lighter-weight lenses rather than simply a cheaper line item.
All fabrication is performed in the USA at an ITAR-registered manufacturer, for components used by Homeland Security, Border Patrol, defense, and security customers as well as commercial OEMs. Controlled programs are manufactured and stored domestically in Minnesota.
IR material choice changes machining, polishing, coating, mounting, handling, and inspection. Review the complete requirement before freezing the substrate.
| Attribute | Typical | Best case | Application note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Silicon mirror | 2″ diameter | Better than 1/2 wave | High-power laser-quality IR example |
| Surface flatness | 1 wave | < 1/20 wave | Wavefront-critical faces and mirrors |
| Parallelism | 30 arc sec | < 5 arc sec | Windows, filters, and beam-steering optics |
| Surface roughness | Ra < 1 µin | Ra < 5 Å | High-energy and scatter-sensitive applications |
These are IRD's published capability figures, not a guarantee for a given print. The silicon mirror figure belongs to a specific 2-inch part; the optical rows are general shop capability across materials. IR substrates differ widely in hardness, thermal behaviour, toxicity handling, and coating compatibility, so every material and surface is quoted individually. No reference wavelength is stated on the published flatness figures — send your measurement condition.
IRD reviews the IR optic inside the finished system — spectral range, environment, mount, mass, coating, inspection, packaging, and production volume — rather than as an isolated polished surface. The cell-based system means a team of engineers whose only task is understanding your product's specifications, tolerances, finishes, packaging, and point-of-use conditions.
The IRD AdvantageUse these lists to frame the first review. The drawing, environment, performance requirement, inspection method, and volume determine the final route.
A web page is hard to attach to a review packet. These are IRD's own published technical documents on the questions this page raises.
What IRD customises on sapphire optics for the aerospace and defense contractors building remote piloted aircraft — size, thickness, parallelism, surface accuracy, roughness, and coating.
ArticleApplication noteThe mix a LiDAR protective window has to hit at once — near-infrared transmission, visible-light rejection, plus strength, thermal, and impact resistance against rock, rain, hail, and thermal shock.
ArticleWhite paperIRD's design guidance for the super-hard IR-transmitting materials — sapphire, spinel, and aluminium oxynitride — covering complexity, finish, precision, clearance features, and material specification.
PDFThe finished component often crosses product categories. These pages cover the nearest materials, processes, and program contexts.
Send the drawing with the spectral band and transmission requirement, substrate if you have chosen one, clear aperture, surface figure and roughness, coating target, mounting and thermal environment, any export-control status, annual volume, and schedule. For a new design, the technical team runs a no-cost Design for Manufacturability review before quoting.
Or call 320.693.7217. If the program is ITAR-controlled, say so at first contact — IRD is registered with the DDTC and keeps that work domestic.