A High Reliability 3D Scanning Measurement of the Complex Shape Rail Surface of the Electromagnetic Launcher

After an electromagnetic railgun launch, a series of damage phenomena may cause the inner bore surface to become complex, such as gouging and deposition. Furthermore, the rail surface will be uneven and blackened by oxidation. To understand these forms of rail degradation, many previous studies have mentioned several surface scanning methods, but none of these can be used in the complex inner bore. Therefore, we present a 3D scanning system based on binocular stereovision technology combined with the active illumination, which can be used to obtain the rail surface topography under a complex inner bore environment. The laser dot projection is applied as the active illumination. In contrast with other active illumination, laser dot projection has high reconstruction reliability. By combining laser dot projection with binocular stereovision, the object can be completely reconstructed. In addition, an image acquisition method which can improve image signal-to-noise ratio is proposed. The proof-of-principle experiment of the system is done under dim light conditions. Through the experiment, the 3D depth map of the rail surface is obtained and the gouge crater is scanned out. Meanwhile, system evaluation and measurement uncertainty analysis have also been carried out.