METHOD FOR DETERMINING A POSITION AND ORIENTATION OF AN OBJECT USING A PROFILOMETER

A method of determining position and orientation of an object using a profilometer. A measurement body has a predetermined polyhedral basic form and a defined spatial relationship with the object. The profilometer captures rectilinear coordinates of at least three measurement points lying on a profile line defined by a profilometer scan-line. Using the coordinates and measurement body geometric values, rotations of the measurement body are calculated about a measurement body z-axis, an intermediate y-axis resulting from the z-axis rotation, and about a profilometer-defined x-axis. Next, three translation displacements of the measurement body relative to the three profilometer-defined axes are calculated using the coordinates, the geometric values of the measurement body, and the above-calculated rotations. The position and an orientation of the object is determined by then applying the defined spatial relationship of the measurement body to the object.