Consistent 3D Model Construction with Autonomous Mobile Robots

Digital 3D models of the environment are needed in facility management, architecture, rescue and inspection robotics. To create 3D volumetric models of scenes, rooms or buildings, it is necessary to gage several 3D scans and to merge them into one consistent 3D model. This paper presents a system, composed of a fast and robust, autonomous mobile robot, a precise, cost effective, high quality 3D laser scanner, and reliable scan matching algorithms for measuring and reconstructing environments, capable of matching two 3D scans within a fraction of a second. The proposed new software modules for scan matching are fast variants of the iterative closest point algorithm (ICP) for consistent alignment. Two applications are presented: First, the reconstruction of an office environment, second, the fitting of sewer pipes into 3D data to detect deviations from the spatial geometry.