Detection of honeycomb cell walls from measurement data based on Harris corner detection algorithm

A honeycomb core is a discontinuous material with a thin-wall structure-a characteristic that makes accurate surface measurement difficult. This paper presents a cell wall detection method based on the Harris corner detection algorithm using laser measurement data. The vertexes of honeycomb cores are recognized with two different methods: one method is the reduction of data density, and the other is the optimization of the threshold of the Harris corner detection algorithm. Each cell wall is then identified in accordance with the neighboring relationships of its vertexes. Experiments were carried out for different types and surface shapes of honeycomb cores, where the proposed method was proved effective in dealing with noise due to burrs and/or deformation of cell walls.