Laser

QINSy has long been known for producing fully corrected and geo-referenced multibeam point clouds in real-time. That ability led Mobile Laser Mapping System users to ask QPS if QINSy would generate similarly corrected and geo-referenced point clouds on-the-fly for laser systems interfaced to GNSS and INS sensors. While mobile platforms were already used in the land survey industry to collect the data, the idea of a REAL-TIME laser scanning system was to produce a DTM on-the-fly that is fully corrected for height, motion, position and timing as acquisition proceeds, consequently saving a great deal of post-processing time.

application

Setting about the task of dealing with even larger volumes of data, at higher output rates than multibeam, QPS added support for REAL-TIME laser scanning in 2009. QINSy is now able to interface to most of the laser scanning systems being used in the land survey industry. As with multibeam, QINSy is able to acquire data from multiple laser scanning systems simultaneously to produce a homogenous point cloud on-the-fly.

sensors

The accuracy of some modern laser scanning systems is extremely high. Many systems are able to measure ranges to the centimeter level over distances of more than 250 meters. As with any survey, required final positioning accuracy dictates the quality of systems employed. For final positioning of the highest order,

accurate range measurements must be complemented by using GNSS positioning systems corrected with VRS-RTK and inertial navigation systems (INS) of the highest rank. Employing quality sensors, REAL-TIME laser scanning can be performed at speeds of 80 km/h. High end INS even allows data acquisition for limited time periods through tunnels and in other conditions where GNSS positioning is periodically problematic.
QINSy is able to compute and store more than 500.000 points per second without any problem. As a result the user has a nearly finished end product straight after the survey was executed. The final end result can be enhanced by importing trajectory data from the Inertial Navigation System or INS, thereby improving particularly the height component to the millimeter level.
The resultant fully geo-referenced point cloud is available to 3rd party systems for further processing, e.g. extracting 3D surfaces.

usages

With QINSy, a Mobile Laser Mapping System is ideal for scanning roads, urbanized areas, mines, stockpiles etc. in a very short time. But laser systems are also extremely useful in the marine environment, where lasers can be combined with multibeam to measure above and below water simultaneously. This application is ideal for scanning canals, ship channels and rivers. The once arduous task of surveying the underside of bridges is now accomplished in double quick time with a few vessel runs to map in the entire bridge.