Computer-Aided Inspection Planning: A Multisensor High-Level Inspection Planning Strategy

Computer-aided inspection planning (CAIP) has gained significant research attention in the last years. So far, most CAIP systems have focused on the use of a touch probe mounted on a coordinate measuring machine (CMM). This article investigates multisensor measurement aiming to perform automatic and efficient inspection plans. High-level inspection planning, which deals with sequencing of measuring operations, is the main concern of inspection planning. This paper presents an automatic approach to generate inspection sequences by combining laser sensor and touch probe, and by giving preference to the measurement using the laser sensor if quality requirements are satisfied. The proposed approach consists of three steps. In the first step, recognition of inspection data from the computer-aided design (CAD) part model is carried out based on the concept of inspection feature (IF), and the extracted information is stored in a database. In the second step, a list of privileged scanner orientations is proposed by analyzing the accessibility of both sensors. In the third step, a sequence of operations is generated iteratively. For a given scanner orientation, the ability of the laser sensor is assessed according to an original process based on fuzzy logic model. If the laser sensor does not meet the ability requirements, touch probe ability is assessed. The proposed approach is implemented and tested on a part defined by its CAD model and specifications.