Tracking error Calibration

Background
Due to the inertia of the scanhead motors and scan mirrors there is a slight delay from issuing a
move command to moving to the actual position. Scanlab states a delay of 460us with a tolerance of
±10% for the intelliweld30FC scan head installed in the Aeroswift machine. Figure 1 below shows
an graphical representation of the tracking errors.

Figure 1.

In order to calibrate the scanning software to account for this tracking error and experiment was
designed to find a more accurate value for the tracking error within the ±10% tolerance of the
tracking error.

Experiment

Once the scanner X,Y position has moved for a relative short distance to achieve a constant move
speed, only the tracking error will have an impact on where the line end point will be. Thus if the
tracking error is varied so will the line end points, given the scanner has moved at a constant speed.
This principle was used to find the most correct tracking error. Lines where drawn as shown in
figure 2.
 Start points

End points

Start points
(A) (B) (C)
Figure 2.

Figure 2 A shows lines where the tracking error estimation was too short. Thus the lines are ending
prematurely. Conversely figure 2 B shows lines where the tracking error was too long. Figure 2 C
represent lines where the tracking error is correct.

The experiment was performed to scribe the pattern as in figure 2 for the range -10% to +10% of
the tracking error taken as 460us. Figure 3 shows the best result from the experiment.

Figure 3.

The result was a tracking error value of 478us. This value is a 4% deviation from the stated tracking
error and thus falls within the ±10% range specified by Scanlab. Note that due to the spherical
shape of the laser spot the actual end point of the line is at the center of the line as indicated by the
blue line was drawn on figure 3. It clearly shows that the line end points mostly match up.

This was a first order calibration. A follow-up experiment can be performed to test more focused
values within the +4% to +5% range.
Contour Calibration
Background
In the Aeroswift system provisions have been made to melt a border or outlines of a part. This
function will be performed with the RTC5 API commands. The RTC5 commands inherently do not
execute at a constant scan speed. In order to enable the execution at a constant scan speed, the
scanning can be performed by enabling the skywriting function of the RTC5 control card. With
skywriting the RTC5 card automatically calculates and adds run-in and run-out times for a scribe
line to account for the tracking error. This enables the system to achieve a constant move speed and
to start the line scribing at exactly the right position.

Experiment

The parameters that need to be calibrated to ensure correct skywriting operation are tracking error,
laseron-shift, run-in time and run-out time. The tracking error was found with the tracking error
calibration test. The run-in and run-out time was left at the RTC5 default values as defined by
Scanlab. At a later stage the run-in and run-out values can be optimized to minimize the time wasted
by each skywriting vector but this has no effect on the positional accuracy of the vector. With the
experiment the laseron-shift was calibrated. The experimental pattern used is shown in figure 4
below.

(A) (B)

Figure 4

Figure 4 A shows an example where the laseron-shift is too large. The scribing vector start is
delayed for too long an thus leaves a visible gap at the start of the shape's corner. Figure 4 B shows
the correct shape with the correct laseron-shift value. Note that the start and end points in the figure
is separated for illustration purposes but in reality start and end points should match-up exactly.

Figure 5 and figure 6 shows the results of the experiment.

 Figure 5

Figure 6

In figure 5 a laseron-shift of 50us was used. As illustrated in figure 4 A both shapes have a gap in
the corners thus proving 50us is too large. In figure 6 the laseron-shift was set to -50us. A negative
value switches the laser on 50us before the start of the vector. Due to the known laser delay inherent
to the laser system used in the Aeroswift machine, this proves to be the correct value to perform the
contour scribing for a given shape.