• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.14 no.5
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• pp.943-960
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• 2014

A visually servoed paired structured light system (ViSP) was recently proposed as a novel estimation method of the 6-DOF (Degree-Of-Freedom) relative displacement in civil structures. In order to apply the ViSP to massive structures, multiple ViSP modules should be installed in a cascaded manner. In this configuration, the estimation errors are propagated through the ViSP modules. In order to resolve this problem, a displacement estimation error back-propagation (DEEP) method was proposed. However, the DEEP method has some disadvantages: the displacement range of each ViSP module must be constrained and displacement errors are corrected sequentially, and thus the entire estimation errors are not considered concurrently. To address this problem, a pose-graph optimized displacement estimation (PODE) method is proposed in this paper. The PODE method is based on a graph-based optimization technique that considers entire errors at the same time. Moreover, this method does not require any constraints on the movement of the ViSP modules. Simulations and experiments are conducted to validate the performance of the proposed method. The results show that the PODE method reduces the propagation errors in comparison with a previous work.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.801-818
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• 2016

To estimate structural displacement, a visually servoed paired structured light system (ViSP) was proposed in previous studies. The ViSP is composed of two sides facing each other, each with one or two laser pointers, a 2-DOF manipulator, a camera, and a screen. By calculating the positions of the laser beams projected onto the screens and rotation angles of the manipulators, relative 6-DOF displacement between two sides can be estimated. Although the performance of the system has been verified through various simulations and experimental tests, it has a limitation that the accuracy of the displacement measurement depends on the alignment of the laser pointers. In deriving the kinematic equation of the ViSP, the laser pointers were assumed to be installed perfectly normal to the same side screen. In reality, however, this is very difficult to achieve due to installation errors. In other words, the pose of laser pointers should be calibrated carefully before measuring the displacement. To calibrate the initial pose of the laser pointers, a specially designed jig device is made and employed. Experimental tests have been performed to validate the performance of the proposed calibration method and the results show that the estimated displacement with the initial pose calibration increases the accuracy of the 6-DOF displacement estimation.

• Journal of Institute of Control, Robotics and Systems
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• v.18 no.6
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• pp.579-583
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• 2012

The purpose of this paper is to suggest IDE (Incremental Displacement Estimation) algorithm for the previously proposed visually servoed paired structured light system. The system is composed of two sides facing with each other, each with one or two lasers with a 2-DOF manipulator, a camera, and a screen. The 6-DOF displacement between two sides can be estimated by calculating the positions of the projected laser beams and rotation angles of the manipulators. In the previous study, Newton-Raphson or EKF (Extended Kalman Filter) has been used as an estimation algorithm. Although the various experimental tests have validated the performance of the system and estimation algorithms, the computation time is relatively long since aforementioned algorithms are iterative methods. Therefore, in this paper, a non-iterative incremental displacement estimation algorithm which updates the previously estimated displacement with a difference of the previous and the current observed data is introduced. To verify the performance of the algorithm, experimental tests have been performed. The results show that the proposed non-iterative algorithm estimates the displacement with the same level of accuracy compared to the EKF with multiple iterations with significantly less computation time.