A strategy to automatically planning measuring path with CMM offline

Automatically planning measuring program without CMM (Coordinate Measuring Machine) device can save CMM running cost and programming time. This paper presents a strategy to automatically planning measuring program with a scheme of properly combining the measuring points and the path control points with a reasonable sequence which is realized by building datum plane. An algorithm is discussed on how to manage the control points on the datum plane, e.g., inserting, editing and deleting operations; and the algorithm of sorting the control points along measuring path and generating a collision-free measuring program is discussed as well. A prototype software tool is developed with CMM machine offline mode with the proposed method. In terms of the test result, it shows that the generated measuring program meets the standard of DMIS (Dimension Measuring Interface Standard) and can drive CMM machine to execute measuring tasks correctly by which the measuring time can be saved about 30% compared with the conventional method.