Non-landing vehicle-mounted electro-optical theodolite deformation measurement method using inertial sensors

Abstract

Working on a vehicle platform, an electro-optical (EO) theodolite’s measurement accuracy deteriorates due to platform deformation caused by external forces, such as the acceleration and deceleration of the EO theodolite, wind and people walking on the platform. This paper presents a vehicle platform deformation measurement method using inertial sensors. The necessity of the vehicle platform’s deformation measurement is thoroughly analyzed. An inertial sensor calibration method is then proposed so that the platform’s three-dimensional deformation can be calculated by the inertial sensors’ axes outputs. Experiments show that the measurement resolution reaches 2” and the measurement error is less than 4”. The proposed method does not require a reference device, and hence largely improves the measurement system’s stability and adaptability.