A steepest descent algorithm for circularity evaluation

Li-Min Zhu
a
, Han Ding
a,
*
, You-Lun Xiong
b
a
School of Mechanical Engineering, Shanghai Jiaotong University, Shanghai 200030, People's Republic of China
b
School of Mechanical Science & Engineering, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074, People's Republic of China
Received 31 May 2001; revised 15 November 2001; accepted 17 November 2001
Abstract
This paper presents a novel algorithm for evaluating the circularity of a mechanical part by using measurement points obtained with a
coordinate measuring machine (CMM). Following the minimum zone criterion set forth in the current ANSI and ISO standards, evaluation of
circularity is formulated as a non-differentiable unconstrained optimization problem, and based on the geometric representation of the
necessary and sufcient condition for the optimal solution, an efcient steepest descent optimization procedure is proposed to nd the
circularity value. The steepest descent direction is determined by the method of calculating the minimum translational distance between two
convex polygons, which is initially introduced in the eld of robot path planning, and the length of the moving step is exactly determined by a
presented geometrical method. A computational geometry-based method for pre-processing the measured data is also proposed. In compari-
son with existing methods, this algorithm has the advantages of computational efciency and high precision. Simulations and practical
example conrm the validity of the presented algorithm. q 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Circularity evaluation; Minimum zone solution; Optimization; Minimum translational distance; Computational geometry
1. Introduction
The geometric form of any manufactured feature will
always deviate from its nominal design to some degree,
owing to random and/or systematic errors. In order to satisfy
certain functional requirements or assembly conditions,
geometric tolerances are usually assigned to some selected
features, serving as allowable variations. Traditional ways
of qualifying mechanical parts are through manual checking
against some standard gages. Nowadays rapid advances in
numerical control (NC) and precision machining techniques
have turned coordinate measuring machines (CMMs) into
de facto choice of inspection tools in most manufacturing
applications. To yield critical geometric deviations of the
measured part, data obtained by a CMM must be analyzed
or interpreted using appropriate algorithms, which should
conform to the specications laid down in the standards.
The circular feature is one of the most basic geometric
primitives because many mechanical parts depend on a
small circularity error to have adequate performance.
Four methods are commonly used to evaluate the circular-
ity error: least-squares circle (LSC) method, maximum
inscribed circle (MIC) method, minimum circumscribed
circle (MCC) method, and minimum radial separation
(MRS) method (also known as minimum zone circle
(MZC) method). Although the former three ones have
their attractive advantages [1], only the MRS method
complies with ANSI and ISO standards. With the MRS
method, two concentric circles with minimum radial separa-
tion (MRS circles) are found that contain the prole. The
radial difference between these two circles gives the value
of the circularity error. The median circle of the MRS circles
is known as the MZC, an ideal circle such that the maximal
deviation between it and the actual measured data has the
least possible value. Let S {p
i
[ R
d
; 1 # i # k} be the
dataset measured by a CMM, where d 2: Here not den-
itely setting d to be 2 is to show that when d 3; most of the
conclusions drawn in this paper are still valid, i.e. they are
also applicable to sphericity evaluation. Evaluation of circu-
larity error based on the MRS method could be formulated
as the following non-differentiable unconstrained optimiza-
tion problem, of which the optimal value gives the circular-
ity value.
P1 min
u[R
d
Eu max
p
i
[S
ip
i
2ui 2min
p
i
[S
ip
i
2ui
where notation ii denotes Euclidean norm, i.e. ixi

x
T
x
p
with superscript T representing transposition. The optimal
solution provides the center of the MRS circles (MRS
center). Introducing two extra variables j
1
and j
2
; problem
Computer-Aided Design 35 (2003) 255265
COMPUTER-AIDED
DESIGN
0010-4485/02/$ - see front matter q 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
PII: S0010-4485(01)00210-X
www.elsevier.com/locate/cad
* Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: mehding@cityu.edu.hk (H. Ding), hding@mail.
sjtu.edu.cn (H. Ding).
P1 could be re-formulated as the following differentiable
constrained optimization problem.
P2 min
u[R
d
;j
1
;j
2
Hu; j
1
; j
2
j
1
2j
2
s:t:
ip
i
2ui # j
1
;
ip
i
2ui $ j
2
_
1 # i # k
Note that a feasible solution u; j
1
; j
2
to the problemP2 has
the intuitive interpretation of two concentric circles with
center u, and with j
1
and j
2
being the radii of the larger
and smaller circles, respectively. The points in S belong to
the region bounded by these two circles.
So far a number of methods have been presented for
resolving these two optimization problems. Due to the
non-differentiable nature of the problem P1, some uncon-
strained optimization methods that do not rely on the deri-
vative information, such as simplex algorithm [2,3], genetic
algorithm [4] and simulated annealing algorithm [5], are
used to nd its global optimal solution. However, all of
these algorithms have little solid basis in mathematical
theory, thus offer no guarantees of efcient numerical
convergence. Wang, Hu and Shi et al. [6] construct a differ-
entiable unconstrained optimization problem, which is
approximately equivalent to the problem P1, and resolve
it by the standard optimization techniques. However,
serious numerical problem may be encountered in the opti-
mization procedure because that objective function often
becomes ill-conditioned when the variable, in vector form,
nears the optimal solution. If the measured part is well-
aligned with the measurement datum, Euclidean norm in
problem P1 and P2, as a function of u, could be linearized
(also geometrically known as the technique of limacon
approximation), which yields two simplied linear models.
Algorithms of linear programming [7], linear Chebyshev
approximation [8] and exchange point [9] are efcient for
resolving them. If the alignment requirement is not perfectly
satised or high accuracy result is needed, some standard
constrained optimization methods could be used to directly
resolve problem P2 [10,11]. As general-purpose numerical
methods, all the approaches mentioned above do not fully
utilize the geometric specialties of the circularity evaluation
problem, which greatly decreases the computational ef-
ciency. Another well-known family is geometric method.
Ventura and Yeralan [12] develop a necessary condition
for the optimal solution of problem P1 (or P2), stating
that there are at least a total of four points on the outer
and inner circles of the MRS circles, with at least one
point on the outer or the inner circle. Based on this conclu-
sion, an enumeration method is used to check all four points
combinations to nd the global optimal solution of problem
P1 (or P2). The complexity of this approach is O(k
5
), also a
heuristic algorithm is proposed to improve the efciency.
Other two heuristic algorithms are proposed by Rajagopal
and Anand [13], and Jywe, Liu and Chen [14]. Although
they are very efcient in some examples, their convergences
are not guaranteed due to their heuristic nature. Etesami and
Qiao [15] exploit the properties of Voronoi diagrams to
show that the MRS center is located at one vertex of the
intersection between the farthest and nearest regions. Thus,
the optimal solution could be obtained by checking all
vertices and picking the one which gives minimum objec-
tive value. The complexity of this algorithm is O(k
2
). A
method based on the similar idea is proposed by Roy and
Zhang [16] with step-by-step implementation procedure
being described in detail. Huang [17] further categorizes
the vertices into X and Y-types, and shows that only the X-
type vertex, i.e. an intersection point between the edges of
the farthest and the nearest Voronoi diagrams, can host the
optimum solution, hence only such vertices should be
enumerated. Since the construction of the Voronoi diagrams
around all data points is a time-consuming work, Huang also
presents a strategy to isolate the critical data points as early
as possible so that the computation around redundant data
points can be reduced [18]. For the measured points of
which the angular order is known, an improved Voronoi
diagram-based algorithm has complexity O(k log k) [19].
Samuel and Shunmugam [20] point out that coordinate
data obtained using CMM and form data obtained using
roundness measuring instrument have to be handled differ-
ently. They use the equi-angular Voronoi diagrams to
process the form data. It is seen that, with geometric
methods, the exact global optimal solution are found by
exhaustively checking every candidate of local minimum,
however, no any directive information is used during the
enumeration. Lai and Chen [21] propose a new method
that transforms the circularity error evaluation problem
into a minimum zone straightness problem using a non-
linear mapping. It is known that minimum zone straightness
tolerance requires only two points on one edge of the toler-
ance zone and one point on the other edge, this property
contradicts the result that there must exist at least two points
on the outer circle and two points on the inner circle of the
MRS circles [17,19]. Therefore, this method cannot provide
optimal solution. By using algebraic distance as a surrogate
for geometric distance, Gass, Witzgall and Harary [22]
develop a linear programming approach to locate the
MRS center approximately. In most of the given examples,
the centers found coincide with the true ones. Recently,
Wang, Cheraghi and Masud [23] propose a direct descent
algorithm to resolve problem P1, which has an explicit
geometric meaning, but do not answer how to nd the
best descent direction.
This paper will present a novel algorithm to nd the value
of circularity error according to the minimum zone criterion.
Essentially, it is the steepest descent optimization algorithm,
however, it fully exploits the geometric information implied
in problems P1 and P2, thus exhibits high accuracy and
efciency. The remainder of this paper is organized as
follows. In Section 2, a computational geometry-based
method for pre-processing the measured data is developed.
In Section 3, the algebraic and geometric representations of
L.-M. Zhu et al. / Computer-Aided Design 35 (2003) 255265 256
the necessary and sufcient condition for the optimal solu-
tion are introduced and claried. In Section 4, the novel
algorithm for circularity error evaluation is presented,
with the methods of determining the steepest descent direc-
tion and the moving step length being specied in detail. In
Section 5, the global optimality of the solution obtained by
the proposed algorithm is analyzed. Simulations and real
application are given in Section 6, and conclusions in
Section 7.
2. Computational geometry-based method for pre-
processing the measured data
Denition 1. Given a point u [ R
d
; r
u
min
denotes the mini-
mum distance from u to S, i.e. r
u
min
min
p
i
[S
ip
i
2ui; the
set of nearest neighbors of u in S is dened as NNu
{p
i
[ Suip
i
2ui r
u
min
}: Similarly, r
u
max
denotes the maxi-
mum distance from u to S, i.e. r
u
max
max
p
i
[S
ip
i
2ui; the
set of farthest neighbors of u in S is dened as FNu
{p
i
[ Suip
i
2ui r
u
max
}:
Evidently there is at least one point in NNu or FNu:
Normally, for d 2; the total number of points in sets
NNu and FNu is no more than four because four points
are enough to determine a pair of concentric circles, if there
are more than four points lying on the two concentric
circles, some additional constraints must be satised. For
the point u and the data points shown in Fig. 1, NNu
contains points p
n
1
and p
n
2
while FNu contains the points
p
f
1
and p
f
2
.
Theorem 1. Let the convex hull of the points set S be
CHS; and the vertices set of CHS be CHVS: There
exists FNu # CHVS ;u:
Proof. Obviously we only need to prove that FNu >
CHVS f where overbar denotes complement. Assume
that CHVS {p
1
; p
2
; ; p
m
} where m # k: ;p
i
[
CHVS can be represented as a positive convex combina-
tion of a subset of CHVS; which is denoted as
{p
i
1
; p
i
2
; ; p
i
J
} where J $ 2 and 1 # i
j
# m 1 # j # J;
i.e.
p
i

J
j1
b
j
i
p
i
j
where

J
j1
b
j
i
1; and b
j
i
. 0 for 1 # j # J
Note that function gx ix 2ui
2
; where x; u [ R
d
; is
strictly convex with respect to the variable x, hence we get
ip
i
2ui
2
gp
i
g

J
j1
b
j
i
p
i
j
_
_
_
_
,

J
j1
b
j
i
gp
i
j

J
j1
b
j
i
ip
i
j
2ui
2
# r
u
max
_ _
2
which means p
i
FNu; so FNu >CHVS f: A
Therefore, only the points in CHVS should be con-
sidered when calculating the max term in the optimization
problem P1. When d 2 or 3, there are standard convex
hull algorithms to quickly get CHVS from S [24].
Although in the case d 2; the same conclusion has been
drawn using geometric method [15], the algebraic analysis
presented here shows that it is also applicable to high
dimension problem such as sphericity evaluation.
3. Necessary and sufcient condition for the optimal
solution
For u [ R
d
; v [ S
d21
; where S
d21
denotes the unit hyper-
sphere of dimension d, let a
v
i;u
be the angle determined by
the vectors v and up
i
-!
; i.e. cos a
v
i;u
up
i
-!
v=ip
i
2ui where
bolddot denotes scalar product, then we give the following
denition.
Denition 2. Given a point u [ R
d
and a vector v [ S
d21
;
a
v
n;u
denotes the minimum angle determined by the vectors v
and up
i
-!
for p
i
[ NNu; i.e. a
v
n;u
min
p
i
[NNu
a
v
i;u
or
cos a
v
n;u
max
p
i
[NNu
cos a
v
i;u
; MINNu; v; the set of mini-
mum angle (with respect to v) nearest neighbors of u, is
dened as MINNu; v {p
i
[ NNuua
v
i;u
a
v
n;u
}: Simi-
larly, a
v
f ;u
denotes the maximum angle determined by the
vectors v and up
i
-!
for p
i
[ FNu; i.e. a
v
f ;u
max
p
i
[FNu
a
v
i;u
or cos a
v
f ;u
min
p
i
[FNu
cos a
v
i;u
; MAFNu; v; the set of
maximum angle (with respect to v) farthest neighbors of
u, is dened as MAFNu; v {p
i
[ FNuua
v
i;u
a
v
f ;u
}:
L.-M. Zhu et al. / Computer-Aided Design 35 (2003) 255265 257
Fig. 1. Nearest and farthest neighbors.
Obviously, if d 2; there are at most two elements in set
MINNu; v or MAFNu; v: By using Taylor expansion we
easily obtain
ip
i
2u 1lvi ip
i
2ui 2l cos a
v
i;u
1
l
2
2
sin
2
a
v
i;u
ip
i
2ui
1Ol
3
1
where l is a positive innitesimal value. Therefore, if l is
small enough, MINNu; v and MAFNu; v would be,
respectively, the nearest and farthest neighbors of the
point u 1lv; i.e. NNu 1lv MINNu; v and FNu 1
lv MAFNu; v: Hence, we have
Eu
0
1lv Eu
0
1l cos a
v
n;u
0
2cos a
v
f ;u
0
_ _
1
l
2
2
sin
2
a
v
f ;u
0
ir
u
0
max
i
2
sin
2
a
v
n;u
0
ir
u
0
min
i
_ _
1Ol
3

2
Obviously, if there exists a vector v [ S
d21
such that
cos a
v
n;u
0
# cos a
v
f ;u
0
; or equivalently, there exists a circular
cone with apex at u
0
and axis along v such that points of
FNu
0
lie in its interior or border while points of NNu
0
lie
in its exterior or border, then u
0
would not be a local mini-
mum and v gives a descent direction. Hence, the necessary
condition for u
0
being the optimal solution of the problem
P1 is that one has cos a
v
n;u
0
. cos a
v
f ;u
0
for all v [ S
d21
; or
equivalently, points sets NNu
0
and FNu
0
cannot be
separated by a circular cone with apex at u
0
. On the other
hand, it is straightforward that u
0
must be an optimal solu-
tion if cos a
v
n;u
0
. cos a
v
f ;u
0
holds for all v [ S
d21
; therefore
the necessary condition is also the sufcient condition.
Denition 3. Given a point u [ R
d
; PNNu; the central
projection of NNu onto the unit hypersphere centered at u,
is dened as PNNu {p
i
2u=r
u
min
up
i
[ NNu}: Simi-
larly, PFNu; the projection of FNu; is dened as
PFNu {p
i
2u=r
u
max
up
i
[ FNu}:
As shown in Fig. 2, for the point u and the data points
depicted in Fig. 1, points n
1
and n
2
are the projections of
the nearest neighbors p
n
1
and p
n
2
while points f
1
and f
2
are the
projections of the farthest neighbors p
f
1
and p
f
2
, where the
circle represented by dashed line is the unit circle. Observ-
ing that the intersection between a circular cone and a
hypersphere is contained in a hyperplane, the previous
necessary and sufcient condition can also be stated saying
that PNNu
0
cannot be separated from PFNu
0
by a hyper-
plane, which is easily found to be equivalent to neither
riCHPNNu
0
>riCHPFNu
0
f nor PNNu
0

and PFNu
0
are actually contained in a hyperplane, by
using the properties of convex set and the separation theo-
rem [25], where notation ri denotes the relative interior of a
set.
For circularity error evaluation d 2; as indicated by
Wang, Cheraghi and Masud [23], there are two cases in
which the preceding necessary and sufcient optimality
condition is satised. The rst one is that there exist three
points in NNu
0
and three points in FNu
0
such that the
nearest points are located on the lines that connect u
0
to the
farthest points, as shown in Fig. 3(a). The other one is that
there exist two points in NNu
0
and two points in FNu
0

such that these four points are distributed alternatively

around u
0
, as shown in Fig. 3(b). However, in practical
applications, the rst case would never occur because it
suggests an incompatible measurement strategy where
measurements at the same nominal point on the circle
give two different extreme values for departure from circu-
larity. So, for practical circularity error evaluation, the
necessary and sufcient condition for u
0
being the MRS
center is that there exist two farthest neighbors and two
nearest neighbors of u
0
such that they interlace anglewise
as seen from u
0
, or equivalently, there exist two points
f
1
; f
2
[ PFNu
0
and two points n
1
; n
2
[ PNNu
0
such
that the segments f
1
f
2
and n
1
n
2
intersect internally, as
shown in Fig. 4.
4. Algorithm for circularity error evaluation
4.1. Determination of the steepest descent direction
From Eq. (2), the steepest descent direction of the objec-
tive function in P1, at the current solution u
0
, is the optimal
solution of the following optimization problem:
P3
min
v[S
d 21
f v cos a
v
n;u
0
2cos a
v
f ;u
0
max
p
i
[NNu
0

cos a
v
i;u
0
2 min
p
j
[FNu
0

cos a
v
j;u
0
Or, equivalently,
P4 max
v[S
d 21
gv min
a
i
[PFNu
0
;b
j
[PNNu
0

v
T
a
i
2b
j

L.-M. Zhu et al. / Computer-Aided Design 35 (2003) 255265 258

Fig. 2. Projections of the nearest and farthest neighbors.
Note that any unit vector cannot be represented as the
convex combination of the other unit vectors [26], so the
points set PNNu
0
is also the vertices set of CHPNNu
0

and the points set PFNu

0
is also the vertices set of
CHPFNu
0
: Then, when d 2 or 3, it is interesting to
nd that the problem P4 is exactly the denition of the
minimum translational distance (MTD) between the two
convex hulls CHPNNu
0
and CHPFNu
0
; which is
initially introduced in the eld of robot collision-free path
planning [27,28]. Let v
p
be the optimal solution, we can
dene a distance vector d
p
gv
p
v
p
; which is the shortest
translational vector to move CHPNNu
0
into contact with
CHPFNu
0
: The sign of gv
p
species three different
topological relationships between CHPNNu
0
and
CHPFNu
0
; i.e. (I) if gv
p
. 0; CHPNNu
0
and
CHPFNu
0
are disjoint; (II) if gv
p
, 0; CHPNNu
0

and CHPFNu
0
intersect; (III) if gv
p
0; CHPNNu
0

and CHPFNu
0
just contact. Following the discussion in
Section 3, the second status occurs if, and only if, u
0
is an
optimal solution. For practical circularity evaluation d
2; the third status would never occur because the point in
PFNu would not coincide with any point in PNNu:
There is a standard algorithm for computing the MTD
between two 2D or 3D convex hulls [27]. In the remainder
of this paper, we will consider d to be 2. Let uXu denote the
cardinality of the set X, a simple geometric algorithm for
resolving problem P4 will be intuitively introduced as
follows. The detail description can be found in Ref. [27].
Once u
0
is judged to be an optimal solution, this sub-
algorithm and, obviously, the whole optimization algorithm
will terminate. If this sub-algorithm returns a result v
p
; then,
as mentioned before, gv
p
must be greater than zero.
Case 1. uPFNu
0
u 1; uPNNu
0
u 1: Assume that f
1
[
PFNu
0
and n
1
[ PNNu
0
; then d
p
n
1
f
1
--!
and v
p

d
p
=id
p
i; as shown in Fig. 5(a). The point, of which the
projection is f
1
; forms the set MAFNu
0
; v
p
; while the
point, of which the projection is n
1
; forms the set
MINNu
0
; v
p
:
Case 2. uPFNu
0
u 1; uPNNu
0
u $ 2: Assume that f
1
[
PFNu
0
; and n
1
; n
2
[ PNNu
0
are the two neighbors of f
1
:
If the projection of f
1
onto the line n
1
n
2
lies within the
boundaries of n
1
n
2
; then v
p
is perpendicular to the line
n
1
n
2
; and directs to the point f
1
; as shown in Fig. 5(b), the
point, of which the projection is f
1
; forms the set
MAFNu
0
; v
p
; while the two points, of which the projec-
tions are n
1
and n
2
; form the set MINNu
0
; v
p
: Otherwise,
the shorter one of the vectors n
1
f
1
--!
and n
2
f
1
--!
is the distance
vector d
p
and v
p
d
p
=id
p
i; as shown in Fig. 5(c), the point,
of which the projection is f
1
; forms the set MAFNu
0
; v
p
;
while the point, of which the projection is n
1
(or n
2
), forms
the set MINNu
0
; v
p
:
Case 3. uPFNu
0
u $ 2; uPNNu
0
u 1: Assume that n
1
[
PNNu
0
; and f
1
; f
2
[ PFNu
0
are the two neighbors of n
1
:
L.-M. Zhu et al. / Computer-Aided Design 35 (2003) 255265 259
Fig. 4. Distribution pattern of the nearest and farthest neighbors of the
practical MRS center.
Fig. 3. Distribution patterns of the nearest and farthest neighbors of the optimal solution.
If the projection of n
1
onto the line f
1
f
2
lies within the
boundaries of f
1
f
2
; then v
p
is perpendicular to the line f
1
f
2
;
and directs away from the point n
1
; as shown in Fig. 5(d),
the two points, of which the projections are f
1
and f
2
; form
the set MAFNu
0
; v
p
; while the point, of which the projec-
tions are n
1
; forms the set MINNu
0
; v
p
: Otherwise, the
shorter one of the vectors n
1
f
1
--!
and n
1
f
2
--!
is the distance vector
d
p
and v
p
d
p
=id
p
i; as shown in Fig. 5(e), the point, of
which the projection is f
1
(or f
2
), forms the set
MAFNu
0
; v
p
; while the point, of which the projection is
n
1
; forms the set MINNu
0
; v
p
:
Case 4. uPFNu
0
u 2; uPNNu
0
u 2: Assume that
f
1
; f
2
[ PFNu
0
and n
1
; n
2
[ PNNu
0
: If the two segments
f
1
f
2
and n
1
n
2
intersect, the current solution u
0
is a local
optimal solution. Otherwise, the perpendicular distances
from points f
1
and f
2
to line n
1
n
2
are, respectively, calcu-
lated, and the point having the shorter distance is recorded,
assume it is f
1
and the corresponding distance is d
f
1
2n
1
n
2
:
Similarly, the perpendicular distances from points n
1
and n
2
to line f
1
f
2
are, respectively, calculated and the point having
the shorter distance is recorded, assume it is n
1
and the
corresponding distance is d
n
1
2f
1
f
2
: If d
n
1
2f
1
f
2
, d
f
1
2n
1
n
2
;
points n
1
; n
2
and f
1
are selected, and the successive pro-
cedures are the same as those in Case 2, otherwise, points
f
1
; f
2
and n
1
are selected, and the successive procedures are
the same as those in Case 3.
Case 5. uPFNu
0
u $ 2; uPNNu
0
u $ 2: Let M
uPFNu
0
u 1uPNNu
0
u; and dene an array ag[M]. Firstly,
the points in the set PNu
0
; which is the union of PFNu
0

and PNNu
0
; are ordered in the positive (counterclockwise)
direction. Secondly, the array elements are set values
according to the following rule: if the ith element of
PNu
0
is provided by PFNu
0
; then set flagi 1; other-
wise, set flagi 21: Thirdly, the variable count, which is
dened as follows, is calculated.
count uflagM 2flag1u 1

M21
i1
uflagi 2flagi 11u
_ _
=2
The value of count indicates the number of interlacement of
the nearest and farthest neighbors around u
0
. If count .2,
the current solution u
0
is a local optimal solution. Otherwise,
the sign alteration of the array elements just occurs twice,
corresponding to which there are four points f
1
; f
2
[
PFNu
0
and n
1
; n
2
[ PNNu
0
; the successive procedures
are the same as those in Case 4.
L.-M. Zhu et al. / Computer-Aided Design 35 (2003) 255265 260
Fig. 5. Determination of the steepest descent direction.
If the circular order of the measurement points is known,
then only the operation of index comparison is needed to
nd n
1
; n
2
in Case 2 or f
1
; f
2
in Case 3. In practical situations,
as explained in Section 2, Case 5 seldom appears. Addition-
ally it is worthwhile mentioning that in Case 2 or Case 3, the
steepest descent direction is not always perpendicular to the
line n
1
n
2
or f
1
f
2
:
4.2. Determination of the length of the moving step
As concluded in Section 3, if the moving step length l is
small enough, MINNu
0
; v
p
and MAFNu
0
; v
p
are, respec-
tively, the nearest and farthest neighbors sets of the new
point u
0
1lv
p
: Obviously, they are also, respectively, the
minimum angle nearest and maximum angle farthest
neighbors sets of the point u
0
1lv
p
(with respect to the
direction v
p
), i.e. MINNu
0
1lv
p
; v
p
MINNu
0
; v
p
and
MAFNu
0
1lv
p
; v
p
MAFNu
0
; v
p
: From Eq. (2), we
have
Eu
0
1lv
p
1dv
p
Eu
0
1lv
p

1d cos a
v
p
n;u
0
1lv
p
2cos a
v
p
f ;u
0
1lv
p
_ _
1
d
2
2
sin
2
a
v
p
f ;u
0
1lv
p
ir
u
0
1lv
p
max
i
2
sin
2
a
v
p
n;u
0
1lv
p
ir
u
0
1lv
p
min
i
_ _
1Od
3

3
where d is a positive innitesimal value. It is stressed here
that l and d are two different quantities for different
purposes. Assume that p
n
is one point in MINNu
0
; v
p

and p
f
is one point in MAFNu
0
; v
p
; as shown in Fig. 6,
the steepest descent direction v
p
always directs away from
the points p
n
, for any point u
0
1lv
p
on the radial with apex
at u
0
and direction along v
p
, the angle determined by the
vectors v
p
and u
0
1lv
p
p
n
----------!
is always greater than the
one determined by the vectors v
p
and u
0
1lv
p
p
f
---------!
; i.e.
cos a
v
p
n;u
0
1lv
p
, cos a
v
p
f ;u
0
1lv
p
; it follows from Eq. (3)
that v
p
is still a descent direction at the point u
0
1lv
p
:
Therefore, with the increase of the value of l, the value
of the objective function in problem P1 will monotonously
decrease until a new nearest or farthest neighbor is
encountered. If the value of l increases any more,
MINNu
0
1lv
p
; v
p
and MAFNu
0
1lv
p
; v
p
will not
keep being MINNu
0
; v
p
and MAFNu
0
; v
p
; respectively,
i.e. p
n
and p
f
may not belong to MINNu
0
1lv
p
; v
p
and
MAFNu
0
1lv
p
; v
p
; respectively, thus the aforemen-
tioned analysis does not take effect, as a result, v
p
would
not be guaranteed to be the descent direction of the point
u
0
1lv
p
; and the value of the objective function would not
monotonously decrease.
From Fig. 7, if p
i
becomes the new nearest point after
moving the candidate MRS center from u
0
to u
0
1l
i
n
v
p
;
then ip
i
2u
0
1l
i
n
v
p
i ip
n
2u
0
1l
i
n
v
p
i; resulting in
l
i
n

p
i
p
n
--!
u
0
l
i
--!
p
i
p
n
--!
v
p
where l
i
p
i
1p
n
=2
Similarly, if p
i
becomes the new farthest point, then ip
i
2
u
0
1l
i
f
v
p
i ip
f
2u
0
1l
i
f
v
p
i; resulting in
l
i
f

p
i
p
f
--!
u
0
m
i
--!
p
i
p
f
--!
v
p
where m
i
p
i
1p
f
=2
So the length of the moving step should be
l
p
minl
n
; l
f

where l
n
min
l
i
n
.0
l
i
n
for p
i
[ S and l
f
min
l
i
f
.0
l
i
f
for
p
i
[ CHVS:
Obviously, the union of the points p
i
satisfying l
i
n
l
p
and MINNu
0
; v
p
yields NNu
0
1l
p
v
p
; while the union
of the points p
i
satisfying l
i
f
l
p
and MAFNu
0
; v
p
yields
FNu
0
1l
p
v
p
:
4.3. Determination of the initial solution
As with any non-linear optimization problem, good initial
L.-M. Zhu et al. / Computer-Aided Design 35 (2003) 255265 261
Fig. 6. The relationships among v
p
, p
n
and p
f
.
Fig. 7. Determination of the moving step length.
estimates are needed. Note that the real manufactured parts
have circularity error to the order of micron, i.e. the
measurement points almost lie on an ideal circle, thus, the
center of the ideal circle passing through three equi-spaced
points uniformly distributed on the whole nominal circle or
the center of the approximate LS circle [2931] can be
taken as the initial solution of the problem P1. They are
very close to the MRS center, i.e. the initial solution is
very close to the optimal solution, so the algorithm will
converge rapidly. Since LS tting procedure is much less
sensitive to the effects of asperities, the second approach is
preferred in the case that the data points are sampled from a
partial circle.
As described before, if the current solution is not an
optimal solution, a new candidate solution with smaller
objective function value will be generated, since the objec-
tive function in problem P1 is bounded ($0), the presented
algorithm certainly converges to an optimal solution.
5. Global optimality of the optimal solution
Optimization problem P1 is not a convex programming
problem, so there may exist some local minima. It has been
demonstrated that, given an angular order of a set of points,
there is at most one local minimum compatible with this
given order [19]. As indicated in Section 4.3, the initial
solutions recommended are very close to the global optimal
solution, thus, the global optimal solution one is looking for
should preserve the order that observed from those initial
solutions. Because such an optimal solution is unique, we
can assert that for practical circularity evaluation problem,
the solution found by the presented algorithm must be the
global optimal solution. This conclusion can also be drawn
by using the concept of essential subset [32].
6. Performance evaluation
Computer program of the proposed algorithm is written in
C language and run on Celeron 366 MHz machine for the
data available in the literature, the simulated data and the
real data to test the accuracy, the efciency and the prac-
ticality of the algorithm, respectively.
Example 1. The CMM dataset is available in literature
[20], and is included in Appendix A. The initial solution
is set to be the center of the ideal circle passing through
the rst, the ninth and the 17th points. The steepest descent
algorithm terminates after three moves. The results obtained
by the computational geometry method are u
p

40:0007; 50:0015
T
mm and Eu
p
29:2816 mm [20],
while the results obtained by the novel algorithm are u
p

(40.000739,50.001530)
T
mm and E(u
p
) 29.2801747 mm.
There is minor difference between the two results because
double-precision number is employed in the program.
Example 2. The coordinates of the simulated data points
are generated using the following formulas.
x
i
r cos2pi=k 1w;
y
i
r sin2pi=k 1h; i 1; 2; ; k
The above terms without w; h represent points around a
theoretically perfect circle with radius r, which is set to be
13.0 here. Parameters w and h are uniformly distributed
random numbers in the interval 20:1; 0:1 and are used
to introduce variations to the generated points.
Sample sizes of 25, 50, 100, 200, 300, 400, 500, 600, 700,
800, 900 and 1000 are selected and for each sample size
10,000 simulation runs are carried out. The initial solution is
set to be

k
i1
x
i
=k;

k
i1
y
i
=k
T
: Two criteria used as
measures of efciency are the number of moves imple-
mented by the algorithm before arriving at optimal solution
and average CUP time. A summary of the simulation results
is shown in Table 1. The integer number in the table repre-
sents the number of the simulation runs in which the optimal
solution is found after a specic number of moves. The
average computational elapsed time is also shown in Fig. 8.
L.-M. Zhu et al. / Computer-Aided Design 35 (2003) 255265 262
Table 1
Efciency of the algorithm for different sample size problems
Sample size Number of moves Avg. CUP time (ms)
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
25 0 5923 3316 661 94 6 0 0 0.511
50 0 5673 3406 809 103 8 1 0 1.011
100 0 5506 3439 888 155 11 1 0 1.956
200 0 5471 3477 879 149 22 2 0 4.191
300 0 5530 3394 920 143 13 0 0 6.421
400 0 5508 3430 892 156 14 0 0 8.371
500 0 5597 3357 873 155 17 0 1 10.820
600 1 5443 3547 863 126 18 2 0 12.809
700 2 5556 3397 880 152 12 1 0 15.324
800 0 5469 3457 919 138 16 1 0 17.088
900 1 5571 3406 880 130 10 2 0 19.669
1000 0 5528 3421 910 123 16 2 0 21.338
As may be observed from the table and the gure, the
CPU times are negligible, even for large size problems. For
instance, it takes the algorithm an average of about
21.338 ms to nd the optimal solution to the problem with
1000 points. It is also found that the average CPU time is
proportional to the sample size. The efciency of the algo-
rithm in terms of the number of moves is also very promis-
ing. In 10,000 simulation runs for each sample size, more
than half of the optimal solutions are found in only two
moves, and 98% of the optimal solutions are found within
four moves.
The same simulation has been conducted by Wang,
Cheraghi and Masud [23]. The percentages of the optimal
solutions found by the two approaches within a specic
number of moves are compared in Table 2. The number
under S is the result of the steepest descent algorithm
while that under W is the result of Wang's algorithm.
Since the computational burdens of the two algorithms dur-
ing each move are almost the same, our algorithm is
superior to Wang's algorithm. Furthermore, it is found
that our algorithm is little affected by the sample size
while Wang's algorithm degrades greatly with the increase
of the data point number.
Example 3. The coordinates of the simulated data points
are generated according to the following formulas.
r
i
9:0 1r
0
; x
i
r
i
cosu; y
i
r
i
sinu;
i 1; 2; ; k
Parameters r
0
and u are uniformly distributed random
numbers in the interval 0:0; 1:0 and 0:0; 2p: They make
the coordinate of each data point unpredictable. The data
point numbers are selected from 100 to 1000. For each
selected data point number, 100 simulation runs are carried
out. The initial solution is set to be

k
i1
x
i
=k;

k
i1
y
i
=k
T
:
The average CUP times are shown in Table 3 alone with the
results reported by Huang [18]. Note that Pentium-III
machine runs much faster than Celeron-366 machine,
hence our algorithm is better than Huang's algorithm,
which is the fastest computational geometry-based
approach.
Example 4. The real CMM dataset is sampled from a
cross-section of a cylindrical part, and is included in
Appendix B. The initial solution is set to be the approximate
LSC center u
0
82:989744; 97:009120
T
mm; which gives
a circularity value Eu
0
39:104 mm: The steepest descent
algorithm terminates after two moves. The results are u
p

82:990941; 97:008387
T
mm and Eu
p
38:231 mm: The
circularity value found by MRS method is indeed smaller
than that provided by LSC method. The rst and the
sixteenth points are the nearest neighbors of u
p
while the
eighth and the 20th points are the farthest neighbors of u
p
. It
is easy to verify that the distribution of the two nearest and
the two farthest neighbors satises the necessary and suf-
cient condition for u
p
being the optimal solution.
7. Conclusions
From the point of view of optimization, the presented
algorithm is the steepest descent optimization algorithm.
L.-M. Zhu et al. / Computer-Aided Design 35 (2003) 255265 263
Fig. 8. Average CUP time versus sample size.
Table 2
Percentages of optimal solutions found within a specic number of moves
Number of moves
Sample size #2 #4 #6
S (%) W (%) S (%) W (%) S (%) W (%)
25 59.23 60 99.00 99.9 100.00 100.0
50 56.73 50 98.88 98.6 99.99 100.0
100 55.06 47 98.33 96.2 99.99 99.8
200 54.71 38 98.27 82.7 99.98 99.2
500 55.97 20 98.27 84.2 99.99 94.2
1000 55.28 9 98.59 58.7 99.98 86.3
Table 3
Average CUP times (ms)
Sample size 100 200 300 400 500 600 700 800 900 1000 Machine
Steepest descent algorithm 3.3 7.2 10.4 14.2 18.1 22.5 28.0 30.2 33.5 37.4 Celeron-366
Huang's algorithm 22 24 32 36 37 41 40 42 43 48 Pentium-III
Both the steepest descent direction and the moving step
length are exactly determined by geometrical methods with-
out any search procedures. It is easily veried that the inter-
mediate point visited by the algorithm is either on the edge
of the nearest or farthest Voronoi diagram, or just the vertex
of the intersection between the nearest and farthest regions.
During the optimization procedure, the solution moves from
one intermediate point to another one, with the monotonous
decrease of the value of the objective function, until the
optimal solution is found. For example, in some cases
(Fig. 5(b) and (d)), the candidate MRS center moves alone
the perpendicular bisector between two nearest points or
two farthest points until a new nearest or farthest point is
encountered, this procedure is equivalent to that the candi-
date MRS center moves along the edge of the nearest or
farthest Voronoi diagram until it attains a vertex of the
intersection between the nearest and farthest regions. In
contrast, traditional computational geometry-based methods
exhaustively enumerate all such vertices or all X-type
vertices. Hence, the presented algorithm may also be
regarded as a directive search-based computational geome-
try method although no denite concepts of computational
geometry are employed in the algorithm. So, this novel
algorithm is superior to the traditional optimization-based
and computational geometry-based methods.
After minor revisions, this algorithm is also applicable to
analyze the data obtained from the form measuring instru-
ments. Based on its principle, the similar algorithms for
determining the MIC and the MCC used for function-
oriented error evaluation can be easily constructed. Further-
more, most of the conclusions drawn in this paper still hold
true when d 3; enabling the algorithm to be extended to
evaluate the sphericity error.
Acknowledgements
This research is supported by the Natural Science Fund of
China grant Nos. 59990470 and 59985004.
Appendix A. CMM Data 1
Table A1
Appendix B. CMM Data 2
Table B1
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L.-M. Zhu et al. / Computer-Aided Design 35 (2003) 255265 265
Li-Min Zhu is currently a faculty member of
Shanghai Jiaotong University. Born in February
1973, he received the BE degree (with honors)
and the PhD degree in mechanical engineering
from Southeast University in 1994 and 1999,
respectively. From November 1999 to October
2001, he worked as a postdoctoral fellow in
Huazhong University of Science and Technol-
ogy (HUST). His research interests include
robotic manipulation, kinematic geometry,
geometrical reasoning, computational metrology
and mechanical signature analysis.
Han Ding obtained the PhD degree from
Huazhong University of Science and Technol-
ogy (HUST) in 1989. Supported by Alexander
von Humboldt Foundation, he worked at
University of Stuttgart, Germany from 1993
to 1994. From 1994 to 1996, he worked at
School of Electrical and Electronic Engineer-
ing, Nanyang Technological University,
Singapore. He was the recipient of National
Distinguished Youth Scientic Fund of China
(former Premier Fund) in 1997. He published
more than 70 papers in international journals
and proceedings. From 1997 to 2001, he was a Professor of HUST. He is
now a `Cheung Kong' Chair Professor (Special Appointment of the
Yangtze Scholars Award Plan) of Shanghai Jiaotong University. Prof.
Ding is a senior member of IEEE and has served as a reviewer for various
international journals, including Computer-Aided Design. His research
interests include application of computational geometry to design and
manufacturing, robot technology and application, computational intelli-
gence, computational manufacturing and virtual prototyping.
You-Lun Xiong graduated from the Depart-
ment of Mechanical Engineering and Postgrad-
uate School at Xi'an Jiatong University, Xi'an,
China, in 1962 and 1966, respectively. From
1966 to 1980 he was employed by the Depart-
ment of Mechanical Engineering at Huazhong
University of Science and Technology
(HUST), Wuhan, China. From 1980 to 1982,
he was a visiting scholar in the Department of
Control Engineering at Shefeld University,
Shefeld, UK. In 1982, he returned to the
Department of Mechanical Engineering at
HUST, where he is a professor. From 1988 to 1989, he was a visiting
professor in the Department of Aeronautical and Mechanical Engineering
at the University of Salford, Salford, UK. In 1995 he was elected as Acade-
mician of Chinese Academy of Sciences. His research interests include
manufacturing automation, robotics, metrology, computational geometry
and intelligence manufacturing.