Dimensional ratios for stone aggregates from three-dimensional laser scans

The "laser-based aggregate scanning system" (LASS) was developed to rapidly and accurately characterize the three-dimensional shape properties of unbound stone aggregates. A linear motion slide, a laser line scanner, and an integrated computer constitute the hardware of the LASS. Using profile data obtained from laser scans of aggregate particles spread out on a platform, the LASS software virtually rotates each irregularly shaped particle to determine the three principal dimensions used to characterize particle shape. The computational method employed can rapidly process the scanned data without losing critical information. Two hundred randomly selected particles, which have variable material and shape characteristics, were manually measured to obtain data that were then used to verify the accuracy of the LASS results. Good correlation with the manual measurements demonstrates that laser profiling has the potential to be a powerful tool for rapidly analyzing the dimensions of irregularly shaped objects, and could be used for quality-control testing and performance-related characterization of stone aggregate materials.