Optical Tracking of a Tactile Probe for the Reverse Engineering of Industrial Impellers

Different sensor technologies are available for dimensional metrology and reverse engineering processes. Tactile systems, optical sensors and computed tomography are being used to an increasing extent in various industrial contexts. However, each technique has its own peculiarities, which may limit its usability in demanding applications. The measurement of complex shapes, such as those including hidden and twisted geometries, could be better afforded by multi-sensor systems combining the advantages of two or more data acquisition technologies. In this paper, a fully automatic multi-sensor methodology has been developed with the aim at performing accurate and reliable measurements of both external and internal geometries of industrial components. The methodology is based on tracking a customized hand-held tactile probe by a passive stereo vision system. The imaging system automatically tracks the probe by means of photogrammetric measurements of markers distributed over a plate rigidly assembled to the tactile frame. Moreover, the passive stereo system is activated with a structured light projector in order to provide full-field scanning data, which integrate the point-by-point measurements. The tactile methodology has been validated by measuring primitive shapes. Moreover, the effectiveness of the integration between tactile probing and optical scanning has been experienced by reconstructing twisted and internal shapes of industrial impellers.