Techniques to Evaluate Laser Scanners for Advanced Manufacturing Applications

Published

July 23, 2015

Author(s)

Prem K. Rachakonda, Balasubramanian Muralikrishnan, Katharine M. Shilling, Daniel S. Sawyer, Geraldine S. Cheok, Kamel S. Saidi

Abstract

Laser scanners have become indispensable tools for fast and accurate 3D image acquisition applications such as part inspection, reverse engineering, cultural heritage digitization, surveying, automotive robotic navigation etc. The Dimensional Metrology Group (DMG) at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is involved in addressing the lack of standardization in this class of instruments. Such standardization is critical for applications that require accurate dimensional measurements such as reverse engineering, free-form part inspection etc. These instruments lack the necessary commonalities to compare them against one another when used in such critical applications. In this effort, NIST is collaborating with the ASTM E57 committee on 3D imaging systems, and it is aimed at facilitating the adoption of these standards by the instrument manufacturers. This workshop will present the work being done by DMG in the following broad areas: a) Understanding instruments’ construction to model their errors mathematically and compensate for their performance issues, b) Design of calibration procedures, experiments and tests to reveal all the possible error sources in all instruments of this class and c) Data processing techniques and procedures to improve their performance metrics. The topics presented in this workshop will address a wide variety of issues. This includes all the possible sources of errors in these instruments and their effect on dimensional measurements; issues with target selection (material finish, geometry, color, mounting techniques); algorithms that obtain meaningful information from the acquired data that are relevant to spherical coordinate systems.

Pub Type

Talks

Keywords

Laser scanners, evaluation, documentary standards

Citation

Rachakonda, P. , Muralikrishnan, B. , Shilling, K. , Sawyer, D. , Cheok, G. and Saidi, K. (2015), Techniques to Evaluate Laser Scanners for Advanced Manufacturing Applications (Accessed October 21, 2025)