Measurement of 3D Spreader Position Information using the CCD Cameras and a Laser Distance Measuring Unit

Abstract

This paper introduces a novel approach that can provide the three dimensional information about the movement of a spreader by using two CCD cameras and a laser distance measuring unit in order to derive ALS (Automatic Landing System) in the crane used at a harbor. So far a kind of 2D Laser scanner sensor or laser distance measuring units are used as corner detectors for the geometrical matching between the spreader and a container. Such systems provide only two dimensional information which is not enough for an accurate and fast ALS. In addition to this deficiency in performance, the price of the system is too high to adapt to the ALS. Therefore, to overcome these defects, we proposed a novel method to acquire the three dimensional spreader information using two CCD cameras and a laser distance measuring unit. To show the efficiency of proposed method, real experiments are performed to show the improvement of accuracy in distance measurement by fusing the sensory information of the CCD cameras and a laser distance measuring unit.