A freeform surface modelling system based on laser scan data for reverse engineering

Reverse engineering technology starts with a measurement process, inspecting the surface contour of the object, and applies a CAD geometric modelling technique to construct the surface model. The purpose of this study is to develop a freeform surface modelling system involving the functions of data reorganisation and surface construction of reverse engineering. An important task in reverse engineering is the process of reducing the large amount of coordinate data derived by measurement devices. Reduction methods in common use include uniform deviation, division by a factor, spatial sampling, chordal deviation and interpolated sampling. Each of the above modes has its advantages and weaknesses, and suitable application areas. A new data reduction mode, which integrates the space concept and height characteristic, is proposed, called the height decision method. This method can achieve the aim of data simplification while maintaining the curve characteristics of the model. The CAD modelling system is developed by an AutoLISP program with MDT v4.0 software. An egg model is presented in this paper for explanation and verification.