A laser-based machine vision measurement system for laser forming

Laser forming continues to be a promising technology in manufacturing due to its fast speed, flexibility, and low-cost. Measurement of deformation after laser forming is widely needed to verify its convergence to the intended shape in academic research. With the development of laser forming, high requirements on the measurement of the deformed work-piece have been sought such as a 3D profile of the deformed surface, a large measuring range, and measuring convenience. In this paper, a laser-based machine vision measurement system was developed to measure the 3D profile of deformed surface by a one-off scanning process. Based on the 3D profile data, the vertical displacement of the deformed plate was calculated for bending analysis. In addition, as one of the important feature parameters, transverse shrinkage was automatically determined through a novel image-based method during the scanning process. A measuring accuracy of 0.03 mm for vertical displacement measurement and 0.0125 mm for transverse shrinkage were achieved in the developed measurement system. This measurement performance is acceptable in most of the laser forming processes currently studied. (C) 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.