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Imagine being able to detect every situation where heat is a potential indicator of either problems or a system working as intended by simply looking at it. It

Imagine being able to detect every situation where heat is a potential indicator of either problems or a system working as intended by simply looking at it. It would be a wildly valuable tool to any industry that does things. Currently such work is mostly done on a spot basis with IR temp guns and cameras. Imagine being able to see a failing conveyor bearing from across a facility or a low pressure tire as it rolls by.

hollerith 1y ago
But the OP is about near-infrared (NIR) light. Sensitive instruments for detecting NIR can only detect objects hotter than 440 deg F (according to an LLM I just consulted) and even then longer wavelengths are the preferred wavelengths for detection: NIR doesn't start becoming the preferred wavelength till the object gets up to at least 800 deg F. The sun emits tons of NIR, so if this tech has a practical application, I'm guessing it is in detecting objects outdoors during the daytime that look distinctive in NIR and do not look distinctive in visible light, e.g., maybe military hardware covered by fabric or camouflage netting.
- potato3732842 1y ago
  >NIR doesn't start becoming the preferred wavelength till the object gets up to at least 800 deg F. My understanding is that due to the relative bell curve of emitted wavelengths a hot object should still look "funny" in the same way that a cherry red piece of iron still looks like iron, just different. Is that not true for NIR?
  - hollerith 1y ago
    I can't understand the question. But the spectrum of a hot object is not a bell curve. Specifically, there is a sharp cut-off such that there are basically no photons with wavelength below the cut-off. An incandescent light bulb of the type people used in houses in the 1980s and before for example produces a very small amount of UVA, but basically no UVB, UVC, x-rays or lower wavelengths.

hollerith 1y ago

But the OP is about near-infrared (NIR) light. Sensitive instruments for detecting NIR can only detect objects hotter than 440 deg F (according to an LLM I just consulted) and even then longer wavelengths are the preferred wavelengths for detection: NIR doesn't start becoming the preferred wavelength till the object gets up to at least 800 deg F. The sun emits tons of NIR, so if this tech has a practical application, I'm guessing it is in detecting objects outdoors during the daytime that look distinctive in NIR and do not look distinctive in visible light, e.g., maybe military hardware covered by fabric or camouflage netting.

potato3732842 1y ago
>NIR doesn't start becoming the preferred wavelength till the object gets up to at least 800 deg F. My understanding is that due to the relative bell curve of emitted wavelengths a hot object should still look "funny" in the same way that a cherry red piece of iron still looks like iron, just different. Is that not true for NIR?
- hollerith 1y ago
  I can't understand the question. But the spectrum of a hot object is not a bell curve. Specifically, there is a sharp cut-off such that there are basically no photons with wavelength below the cut-off. An incandescent light bulb of the type people used in houses in the 1980s and before for example produces a very small amount of UVA, but basically no UVB, UVC, x-rays or lower wavelengths.