Laser Scanning

The scanner takes 1,000 images a second to build a 3-D image of an object based on its width, height, and depth. The data collected can then be used to automatically generate an image accurate to within two millimetres, even across large complex structures.

Rolton Group has used Cyrax laser scanners in a wide range of building services projects, such as an assignment at a major automotive plant, for which we carried out a feasibility study into the replacement of the factory's heating and ventilation system. The factory, built in the sixties, manufactures thousands of gearboxes a day for assembly plants across Europe. The pace of operations at the factory meant that any approach which called for a programme of lengthy and detailed access to the 93,000 square metre factory floor would be unacceptable.

Additionally, the roof area was already highly serviced, and we needed to be sure that our proposed displacement ventilation system would fit the available space. Using laser scanning meant that we were able to quickly collect the information we needed without interfering with the plant's production lines. The information collected by the system's Cloudworks software was interfaced with our CAD programs and used to design a solution that would dovetail neatly with the existing services.

Other applications have included a large block of pre-war apartments in London, for which we used the scanner in a project to replace an ageing boiler system. There were no original drawings in this case, and we used the data from the scan to ensure that our new plant would fit the available space.