Modeling gimbal axis misalignments and mirror center offset in a single-beam laser tracking measurement system

Abstract

Laser tracking systems based on interferometry have applications in robot and machine tool calibration. Relative distance measurements provided by laser interferometers have an extremely high resolution. However, accuracy errors of a coordinate measuring machine based on laser tracking are dominated by geometric errors in the tracking mirror system. Major geometric error sources include gimbal axis misalignments and mirror center offset. In this paper, a geometric model for a single-beam tracker is developed, in which a necessary and sufficient number of geometric parameters is used to represent these two types of error sources for arbitrary target positions. This model can be used for design, calibration and control of single-beam laser tracking measurement systems.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">&gt;</ETX>