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Parallel calibration based on modified trim strategy

Yaxin Peng (Shanghai University, Shanghai, China)
Naiwu Wen (Shanghai University, Shanghai, China)
Chaomin Shen (East China Normal University, Shanghai, China)
Xiaohuang Zhu (Shanghai University, Shanghai, China)
Shihui Ying (Shanghai University, Shanghai, China)

Assembly Automation

ISSN: 0144-5154

Article publication date: 11 October 2019

Issue publication date: 30 March 2020

98

Abstract

Purpose

Partial alignment for 3 D point sets is a challenging problem for laser calibration and robot calibration due to the unbalance of data sets, especially when the overlap of data sets is low. Geometric features can promote the accuracy of alignment. However, the corresponding feature extraction methods are time consuming. The purpose of this paper is to find a framework for partial alignment by an adaptive trimmed strategy.

Design/methodology/approach

First, the authors propose an adaptive trimmed strategy based on point feature histograms (PFH) coding. Second, they obtain an initial transformation based on this partition, which improves the accuracy of the normal direction weighted trimmed iterative closest point (ICP) method. Third, they conduct a series of GPU parallel implementations for time efficiency.

Findings

The initial partition based on PFH feature improves the accuracy of the partial registration significantly. Moreover, the parallel GPU algorithms accelerate the alignment process.

Research limitations/implications

This study is applicable to rigid transformation so far. It could be extended to non-rigid transformation.

Practical implications

In practice, point set alignment for calibration is a technique widely used in the fields of aircraft assembly, industry examination, simultaneous localization and mapping and surgery navigation.

Social implications

Point set calibration is a building block in the field of intelligent manufacturing.

Originality/value

The contributions are as follows: first, the authors introduce a novel coarse alignment as an initial calibration by PFH descriptor similarity, which can be viewed as a coarse trimmed process by partitioning the data to the almost overlap part and the rest part; second, they reduce the computation time by GPU parallel coding during the acquisition of feature descriptor; finally, they use the weighted trimmed ICP method to refine the transformation.

Keywords

Acknowledgements

This work is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (11771276 and 61731009), the capacity construction project of local universities in Shanghai (18010500600), and the Science and Technology Commission of Shanghai Municipality (14DZ2260800).

Citation

Peng, Y., Wen, N., Shen, C., Zhu, X. and Ying, S. (2020), "Parallel calibration based on modified trim strategy", Assembly Automation, Vol. 40 No. 2, pp. 249-256. https://doi.org/10.1108/AA-06-2019-0104

Publisher

:

Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2019, Emerald Publishing Limited

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