Step 3: Attach Your Contour Sensor

  1. Mount the Contour sensor to the wrist. If you are using a seven axis Absolute arm, you need to mount the sensor in the mount that is in the axis of the seventh joint.

  2. Turn on the Perceptron Sensor controller box by pressing the power button located close to the power connector and the trigger connector. This is not to be confused with the sensor power rocker switch located on the same side of the controller box. The boot sequence for the controller box may take as long as two minutes. You will know when the boot cycle is complete because the green Ready LED will be lit.

  3. When the boot cycle is complete, turn the sensor power rocker switch to the on position. This provides power to the sensor. You can verify that the sensor has power by looking at the three LED’s on the side of the sensor head. The LEDs labeled +12V and +5V should be lit. If they are not on, check the power on the sensor controller box and the sensor cable. The LED marked LASER only comes on when scanning.

  4. With the power on, browse to the Perceptron subdirectory inside the PC-DMIS install directory. Double-click on the WinSen application. This is a diagnostic application provided by Perceptron. When the application is launched, it tries to establish communication with the sensor. If it is successful, you should receive several messages with Status=0x00000000 (All OK). You should also see a line indicating the sensor ID. If there is no sensor ID, there is no communication with the sensor.

  5. Point the sensor at something and then select the Image | Live Sensor Display menu item. You should then be able to see (if you are within the camera's field of view) the live camera image of the part you are scanning. You should also see a red laser stripe projected onto the part.

  6. Once you are satisfied that the system is working correctly, close WinSen.

The sensor cannot communicate with two different host applications at the same time. When you run PC-DMIS, you must make sure that WinSen, or any other application that communicates with the sensor controller, is off.

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