Research Article

Advances in Mechanical Engineering

2019, Vol. 11(4) 1–12
Ó The Author(s) 2019
The study on tire tread depth DOI: 10.1177/1687814019837828
journals.sagepub.com/home/ade
measurement method based on
machine vision

Xi-Bo Wang1, Ai-Juan Li1 , Qin-Peng Ci1, Meng Shi2, Tian-Long Jing2
and Wan-Zhong Zhao3

Abstract
The tire tread depth has strong influence on the braking performance of the vehicle and should be inspected periodically
for driving safety. In order to determine the tire tread depth accurately and automatically, a tire tread depth measure-
ment method based on machine vision was developed. During the measuring, a tire tread radial section image formed by
a laser plane was captured when the tire rolls over the measuring device. Then, the image was calibrated to eliminate
the lens distortion and processed to get the single-pixel center line. Consequently, the center line’s pixel coordinates
were transformed to world coordinates with the calibration information of the laser plane, and a profile curve of the tire
radial section was obtained. Then, the tread grooves on the profile curve were identified and their positions are deter-
mined by an algorithm developed in this research. Finally, the depth of each groove was calculated successively. An
experiment was conducted on a prototype system based on the measurement method developed in this article. The
experimental result indicates that the measurement method can identify the tire tread groove and determine its position
and measure its depth. The depth absolute error is less than 0.2 mm, which can meet the demand of tire tread depth
measurement.

Keywords
Tire tread groove depth, measurement system, machine vision, laser plane, measurement method

Date received: 27 July 2018; accepted: 19 February 2019

Handling Editor: António Mendes Lopes

Introduction depth with image sensors.3,4 Such devices consist of an

array of laser light sources and multiple image sensors
The role of the tire tread groove is to increase the fric-
tion between the tire tread and the road and to remove 1
School of Automotive Engineering, Shandong Jiaotong University, Jinan,
the water between the tire and the road to avoid slip- China
2
page. For safety purpose, it is demanded that the vehi- Shenzhen Anche Vehicle Detection Co. Ltd, Shenzhen, China
3
cle’s tire tread depth could not be reduced below the College of Energy and Power Engineering, Nanjing University of
Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing, China
limiting value. When the tread depth is below 1.6 mm,
the tire should be replaced. Corresponding authors:
Traditionally, the tire tread depth is measured with Xi-Bo Wang, School of Automotive Engineering, Shandong Jiaotong
a depth indicator when the vehicle is at rest. This kind University, Jinan 250023, China.
of measurement is inefficient, human factor dependent, Email: wangxipo@aliyun.com
and inconvenient.1,2 For the purpose of increasing the Ai-Juan Li, School of Automotive Engineering, Shandong Jiaotong
efficiency and reducing labor intensity, attempts have University, Jinan 250023, China.
been made to facilitate the measurement of tire’s tread Email: liaijuan@sdjtu.edu.cn

Creative Commons CC BY: This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License
(http://www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) which permits any use, reproduction and distribution of the work without
further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access pages (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/
open-access-at-sage).
2 Advances in Mechanical Engineering

arranged in a line to acquire the tire’s profile.3 Those

systems reported do not involve automatic identifica-
tion of the tire’s grooves. However, the identification of
the grooves on the tire’s outer most surface is necessary
for automatic measurement.
Huang et al.5 developed a method for groove identi-
fication with a stereo vision system. The difference
between the tire’s outer most surface and the bottom of
the groove was identified by a Fuzzy C-means model.
Thus, the grooves on the tire surface were identified.
However, the tire’s tread depth error with the stereo
vision system reached 1 mm in some cases.5
Measuring technology based on structure light has
been widely used for its stability and convenience.6,7
The system on the tire’s tread depth measurement indi-
cates that structure light measuring method can give
satisfactory accuracy.3 The realization of automatic
identification of the grooves on a single tire section is
necessary for the automatic measurement of the tire’s
tread depth with machine vision and structure light.
In this article, a prototype tire tread depth measure-
ment system is developed. Especially, a method for
identifying the tire’s tread groove is introduced. When
the tire rolls over the device, an image of the profile of
the tire section formed by a laser plane intersection with
the tire was captured. Then, the image is processed and
calibrated to get the tire’s section profile curve. The
grooves on the tire profile curve were identified, and
the tire tread depth was measured. An experiment was Figure 1. The schematic of the system.
conducted and the experimental results indicate that
the measurement method can measure the tire tread
the tire in the mirror. The angle between the mirror and
depth automatically with acceptable accuracy.
the ground is 45°. The lasers adopted are line laser emit-
ters, and the trigger adopted is a photoelectric switch.
Method for tire tread depth measuring The parameters of the line laser emitter and those of the
with machine vision trigger are shown in Table 2. The main reason for the
application of the line laser emitter is that the laser forms
Introduction of the measuring system a laser plane and its projection is a line strip. The laser
In the research, a prototype tire tread depth measuring line width is 0.5 mm and the maximum opening angle of
system was designed as shown in Figure 1. The system the laser emitter is 110°. Two line laser emitters can com-
consist of two cameras, two laser emitters, a reflecting pletely cover the tire tread surface, and two laser emit-
mirror, a supporting plate, a trigger switch and the soft- ters were installed to form one laser plane. The laser
ware based on LabVIEW. There are two windows on plane is placed in front of the mirror, and the angle
the supporting plate for the laser plane passing through between the laser plane and the ground is 45°. The main
and the reflecting mirror seeing the tire. Two cameras reason that a photoelectric switch was applied is that the
(the left camera and the right camera) are fixed under photoelectric switch’s trigger position on the supporting
the supporting plate, and the camera’s principal axis is plate is a line. When the tire rolls over the supporting
parallel to the ground and pointing to the mirror. The plate and passes by the photoelectric switch, the laser
principal axis of the lens passes through the center of the plane intersects with the tire tread and forms the tire
mirror. The distance between the mirror center and the radial section profile, and then, the cameras are triggered
lens is 250 mm. With this distance, each camera has a to capture the tire radial section profile image in the
view width of 250 mm with the selected focal length. reflecting mirror.
Two cameras could cover a view width of 500 mm which The tire radial section profile records the tire tread
is enough for the passenger car tire measurement. The depth and groove numbers. If the laser plane passes
parameters of the cameras are shown in Table 1. The through the center of the tire rotation axis, the depth of
mirror was placed for the cameras to see the image of the groove on the tire radial section profile equals to the
Wang et al. 3

Table 1. Camera parameters.

Items Left camera Right camera

Sensor type CCD CCD

Sensor size 4.9 mm 3 3.6 mm 4.9 mm 3 3.6 mm
Resolution (H 3 V) 1294 pixels 3 964 pixels 1294 pixels 3 964 pixels
Pixel size (H 3 V) 3.75 mm 3 3.75 mm 3.75 mm 3 3.75 mm
Frame rate 30 fps 30 fps
Mono/color Mono Mono
Focal length fx = 6.1 mm, fy = 6.1 mm fx = 6.3 mm, fy = 6.2 mm
Optical center u = 630.8 pixel, v = 491.4 pixel u = 632.6 pixel, v = 452.1 pixel

CCD: charge-coupled device.

Table 2. Laser emitter and trigger parameters.

Laser emitter terms Parameters Trigger terms Parameters

Product name Line laser Product name The photoelectric switch

Product model LT-B6305-GLD Product model LX12-DJ30MNK
Light form Line Detection distance 0–30 m
Line width 0.5 mm Inductive approach The laser correlation type
The opening angle of light 10°–110° The output form NPN normally open
Working voltage DC3-6 V Working voltage DC6-36 V

real tire tread depth, otherwise the measured depth of

the grooves on the image is bigger than the real tire
tread depth. The difference between them increases with
increasing distance between the laser plane and the tire
axis. When the position of the trigger switch on the sup-
porting plate is fixed, the distance from the laser plane
to the tire axis varies with changing tire diameter. In this
article, a model which can get the real depth from the
measured depth for different tire diameters is built. The
model is the basis for the measuring method in this
research.
The laser plane intersects with the tire tread and gets
the tire radial section profile. When the tire rolls over
the supporting plate and passes the photoelectric
switch, the camera is triggered, and the tire radial sec-
tion profile image was obtained. The tire radial section
profile records the tire tread depth and groove num-
bers. If the laser plane passes through the center of the Figure 2. The schematic of the test.
tire rotation axis, the depth of the groove on the tire
radial section profile equals to the real tire tread depth,
direction except for the ground contact area. The laser
otherwise the measured depth of the grooves on the
plane projects on the tire surface which is far from the
image is not equal to the real tire tread depth. The dif-
contact area. So, the tire tread can be simplified to a
ference between them is determined by the relative posi-
cylindrical surface. Projecting the laser plane and the
tion between the tire and the laser plane. Determining
tire tread along the tire axis direction, the diagrammatic
the relative position between the laser plane and the tire
sketch of the measuring system is obtained and shown
is the foundation of tire tread depth measurement.
in Figure 2. The beam OB is the projection of the laser
plane. The arc ABC is the projection of the tire tread.
Line segment AC is the projection of the tire contacting
Mathematical model of the measuring system and with the ground. Line AC is the projection of the
analysis ground. Oc is the projection of the tire rotation axis.
With standard tire pressure, there is a slight variation Take O as the origin and establish the coordinate sys-
in the dimension of the tire tread in the tire radial tem shown in Figure 2. The angle between OB and OA
4 Advances in Mechanical Engineering

is a. The angle between OB and BOc is u. The length of

OA is s, the length of AOp is l, the distance between Oc
and OB is d, and the length of OB is h.

h
In the coordinates established, the coordinates of Oc
are

xOc = s + l ð1Þ
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
yO c = r 2  l 2 ð2Þ
The equation of arc ABC can be given by
 pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi2 r
y r2  l2 + (x  s  l)2 = r2 (y.0) ð3Þ
Figure 3. S-R-h relationship.
The equation of beam OB is

y = x  tan a ð4Þ DHR = DHM  cos u ð11Þ

The intersection of beam OB and arc ABC is B. And For a specific tire with standard tire pressure, the
the coordinates of B meet angle b is affected by the load on the tire. Angle b is
 bigger when the load is heavier. During the measure-
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi2
xB  tan a  r  l 2 2 + ½xB  (s + l) = r 2 2
ð5Þ ment, the vehicle is demanded to bear specific load and
the angle b is nearly constant. Then, l is nearly a con-
From expression (5), the relationship between tire stant for a specific vehicle. When l is constant, the rela-
radius r and the coordinate xB satisfies tionship between radius r, the spacing s, and the
measured distance h is shown in Figure 3. With the
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi x2  ðtan aÞ2  l2 + x2B  2ðs + lÞ  xB + ðs + lÞ2 same distance s, the measured distance h decreases with
r2  l 2 = B the increase in the radius r. There is an one-to-one cor-
2  tan a  xB
ð6Þ respondence between the measured distance h and the
radius when s is a constant. With the same radius r, the
From equation (4), the relationship between coordi- measured distance increases with the increase in dis-
nate xB of point B and h could be deduced tance s. The difference Dh between the measured dis-
tances h of the 0.2 m radius tire and that of the 0.45 m
xB = h  cos a ð7Þ tire increases with the increase in the spacing s. The
numerical calculation of the model indicates that when
Plugging expression (7) into expression (6), an
the distance s is 0.25 m, the measured distance differ-
expression of radius r, measured distance h, and the
ence Dh is about 0.1 m. The laser strip between this dis-
contact length l satisfies
tance difference Dh can be reflected completely in the
" #2 mirror window. The laser strip image of the tires whose
2 h2  l2  2ðs + lÞ  ðh  cos aÞ + ðs + lÞ2 2 radius is in the range from 0.2 to 0.45 m could be cap-
r = +l
2  h  ðsin aÞ tured. A narrow sensing area can be used to save the
ð8Þ pixel resources of the camera with acceptable measur-
ing accuracy.
The angle between OB and BOc is Figure 4 presents the relationship between angle u,
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi! the distance s, and the radius r. In the radius range con-
tanðaÞ(s + 1)  r2  12 sidered, when distance s is a constant, the angle u
u = a sin pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi ð9Þ decreases with increasing radius near linearly. When
1 + tan2 ðaÞ
the radius r is constant, the angle u increases with
u is a function of s, l, h, and a increasing s. When s = 0.25 m, the angle u changes
0 h2 2 i1 from about 6° to about 25° with increase in the radius
h l 2ðs + lÞðhcos aÞ + ðs + lÞ2 r from 0.2 to 0.45 m.
tanðaÞðs + lÞ  2hðsin aÞ
u = a sin@ pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi A Figure 5 shows the relationship between the tire
1 + tan2 ðaÞ radius r, the distance l, and measured distance h when s
is constant. With the same h, the corresponding radius
ð10Þ
r increases with the nearly linear increasing distance l.
The measured tread groove depth on the image and When l is constant, the radius r increases with increas-
the real tire tread depth satisfy ing measured distance h. At the maximum tire radius
Wang et al.
r
Figure 4. S-R-A relationship.
r
Figure 5. H-L-R relationship.
Figure 6. H-L-A relationship.
0.45 m, the measured distance h is about 0.1 m. When l
has a change of 0.02 m, it implies about 0.05 m change
in radius r. From Figure 4, it can be found that when
Figure 7. The work flow of image processing.
5
there is a difference in radius below 0.05 m, the differ-
ence in angle is less than 4°. The difference in angle of
4° can cause an error of 0.039 mm when the tire tread
depth is 16 mm. When the range of distance l is limited
to 0.02 m, the effect of l change on the depth can be
neglected.
Figure 6 shows that the angle u changes with the dis-
tance l when s is constant and h is a variable parameter.
When h equals 0.1, the ratio of angle u and distance l is
maximum. When l has a change of 0.02 m, there is a
change in the angle of less than 4°. The analyses of
Figures 4 and 5 are confirmed.
In summary, the angle between the laser plane and
the tire radius can be determined by measuring h and l.
When the changing range of u caused by the change in l
is less than 4°, the change in l caused by the depth error
is smaller than the system’s resolution. In some cases, l
can be taken as constant with acceptable error. The
changing range of l studied can cover the change in the
real contact distance of the corresponding tires caused
by the tire pressure deviating from standard value. It
indicates that the measuring method presented here can
get acceptable accuracy even l has a small change due
to the tire pressure deviation.
The tire profile laser strip image
processing
The purpose of image processing here is to get the laser
strip center line presented in world coordinates from
the captured tire radial section profile image. The work
flow of image processing is shown in Figure 7.
When the tire reached the trigger switch, the left and
the right cameras are triggered to capture the image
simultaneously. The cameras are controlled with a pro-
gram based on LabVIEW vision module. Each camera
captures a part of the tire surface as shown in Figure 8.
Two images cover the whole width of the tire surface.
The white strip in each image is part of the tire section
profile formed by the laser projection.
Before measuring, the position of the laser plane
relative to the cameras is determined according to previ-
ous studies.8,9 The laser plane is treated as a planer pat-
tern. Its position relative to the camera is described by a
rotation matrix and a translation vector (the extrinsic
parameters).10
6 Advances in Mechanical Engineering
Figure 8. The photograph from the (a) left camera and (b)
right camera.
Figure 9. The segmented image from the (a) left camera and
(b) right camera.
With the intrinsic parameters of the camera, the
images are calibrated to remove lens distortion.10 Then,
the images are filtered to eliminate noise with a
Gaussian filter whose window size is 16 3 16.11
Consequently, the images are segmented by illumination
to extract the laser strip in the image. The extracted
laser strips from the two cameras are shown in Figure 9.
In Figure 9, the pixel value is set to zero except for
the pixels in the laser strip. The tire and the surrounding
images are removed and only the laser strip is left on the
image.12 The shape of the laser strip on the image is rela-
tively simple and the center line of single pixel (Figure 10)
was obtained by grayscale barycenter method.13
The center line’s world coordinates (Figure 11) are
obtained by transforming the center line’s pixel coordi-
nates to world coordinates with the extrinsic para-
meters of the laser plane in the software developed
based on LabVIEW.9,10,14 The center line from the left
camera gives a complete view of the tire’s left shoulder
as shown in Figure 11(a). The center line from the right
camera gives a view that includes the complete right
shoulder of the tire as shown in Figure 11(b). The right
side of the center line from the left camera is overlapped
with the left side of the center line from the right cam-
era. So, the center line from the two cameras together
gives a complete view of the tire’s section profile.
The laser strip center line in world coordinates rep-
resents the tire radial section profile. The origin of the
Figure 10. The center line of the strip in the image from the
(a) left camera and (b) right camera.
world coordinates system is determined by the origin of
the laser plane which is designated during laser plane
position determination. The shape of the center line
and the relative position of two points on the center
line do not change with the change in the origin. The
tread position and depth on the center line in world
coordinates is one-to-one correspondent to the real
tread groove position and depth on the tire. The tire
tread depth can be measured on the center line of world
coordinates.
Tire tread identification and depth
measurement
The identification of the tire tread groove on the laser
strip center line of the world coordinates system is the
key of automatic measuring. The tread groove identifi-
cation includes determining the tread groove character-
istics and determining the grooves’ locations and
numbers. After tread identification, the measurement
of each tread groove’s depth is done successively.
The tread groove characteristic determination
Combine the center line coordinates array from two
cameras together. The whole laser strip center line of
world coordinates array was obtained. Because the
laser strip brightness is uneven, the x coordinates of the
center line is not equally distributed. For the conveni-
ence of data processing, the combined center line coor-
dinates array was interpolated to get a new array whose
x coordinates were equally distributed. The tire radial
section profile curve in the new coordinates was shown
in Figure 12. The abscissa spacing is taken as 0.5 mm,
which could present the shape of the tire radial section
profile without unacceptable detail loss.
It can be found in Figure 12 that the tire tread
groove was characterized as concave on the tire radial
section profile curve. For the reason that there exists
test error and there are smaller scale grooves on the tire
tread surface, there are some smaller concaves on the
Wang et al.
(a)
Figure 11. The curve of the (a) left camera image and (b) right camera image.
Figure 12. The interpolation curve.
tire radial section profile curve except for the concave
from the tire tread groove. It is necessary that the algo-
rithm can distinguish the concave from the tire tread
groove and the concave from other sources during the
tire tread groove identification.
The smaller concave can be removed from the pro-
file curve by applying the Gaussian filters on the curve.
When the scale s of the Gaussian function is applied,
the concave of the corresponding scale on the profile
curve can be strengthened. One task of the tread groove
identification is to select proper scale Gaussian func-
tions. The discrete Gaussian function of scale sk can be
expressed as
 
xi 2
1 
2sk 2
gki = pffiffiffiffiffiffi e ð12Þ
sk 2p
The convolution of the discrete Gaussian function
and the tire radial section profile curve is
Y = yi  gki ð13Þ
7
(b)
Figure 13. The filtered curve.
Figure 13 shows the results of the convolution of the
profile curve of tire 175/70r14 and the discrete
Gaussian function of scales sk = 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11, and
13; the domain of the discrete Gaussian function is xi
2 (23sk, 3sk) and Dxi = 0.5. It can be found that there
is still some obvious convex except for that from the
tire tread groove when scale sk \ 5. When the scale sk
. 11, the convex from the tire tread groove was
smoothed away.
The local maximum extreme points on the filtered
curve by Gaussian function of scales s = 3, 9, and 13
are shown in Figure 14. When s equals 3 or 13, there is
no one-to-one correspondence between the local maxi-
mum extreme points and the tread concave. When
s = 9, the maximum extreme points and the tread con-
caves are one-to-one correspondent by taking the maxi-
mum extreme point at the left side of the groove. The
calculation results showed that when s belongs to 5–11
range, there is one maximum extreme point on each
side of a tread groove, and the one-to-one correspon-
dence between the maximum extreme points and the
concave can be established by taking the maximum
extreme point at one side of the groove.
For the 235/50R18 tire, it has three circumferential
grooves, and the radial section profile curve is shown
8 Advances in Mechanical Engineering
(a)
Figure 14. The extreme value point distribution of s.
Figure 15. The interpolation curve.
in Figure 15. The convolution of the 235/50R18 radial
section profile curve and the discrete Gaussian function
of scale sk = 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11, and 13 are shown in
Figure 16. When s = 3, the convolution curve is
smooth enough to eliminate the small concave from the
test error or the smaller grooves. When s . 5, some
concave from the tire tread groove has been smoothed
away. The local maximum extreme points on the fil-
tered curve by Gaussian function whose scale s = 1, 3,
5, 7, and 11 are shown in Figure 17. When s . 5, there
(b)
(c)
Figure 16. The filtered curve.
is no one-to-one correspondence between the local
maximum extreme points and the radial section profile
curve concave.
For the other ordinary tires, the testing indicates that
when s = 5, the one-to-one correspondence between
the tread concave and the local maximum extreme
points can be established. The tire tread groove can be
identified with the discrete Gaussian function whose
scale is 5. When the tread groove is identified, the loca-
tion of the tread groove and the number of the tread
groove are clarified.
Wang et al. 9

(a) (b) (c)

(d) (e)

Figure 17. The curve and the convolutions with different s: (a) s = 1, (b) s = 3, (c) s = 5, (d) s = 7, and (e) s = 11.

x y x y

x y

(a) (b)

(c) (d)

Figure 18. Single-groove curve of 175/70R14 tire: (a) the first groove from the left, (b) the second groove from the left, (c) the
third from the left, and (d) the fourth groove from the left.

The measure of the tread depth
After the clarification of the tread groove location and
number, the depth of each tread groove can be mea-
sured successively. Between two local maximum
extreme points on the convolution curve, there is a
tread groove. Each tire tread groove curve extracted
from the tire profile curve from 175/70r14 tire and 235/
50R18 tire is shown in Figures 18 and Figure 19,
respectively. The measured depth of each tire tread
groove is the maximum of the distances from the
10
(a)
Figure 19. Single-groove curve of 235/50R18 tire: (a) the first groove from the left, (b) the second groove from the left, and (c) the
third groove from the left.
bottom of the concave to the line ending on each side
of the concave. The depth is calculated by the following
steps:
1. Select the curve for one tread groove. Find the
point with minimum y value and record its coor-
dinates (xB, yB); for convenience, give the point
a name: B.
2. On each side of B, find points with maximum y
value and recorded as L and R and record their
coordinates (xL, yL) and (xR, yR).
3. Test whether all the points on the curve are
under LR. If so, proceed to next step; if not,
take the highest point as new L or R points.
4. Calculate the distance from B to line LR. Then,
the location and depth of the tread groove are
obtained.
5. Repeat steps (1)–(4) until all the tire tread
groove depths are calculated.
There is a difference between the measured depth
and the real depth when the laser plane does not pass
through the tire’s axis as mentioned in section
‘‘Mathematical model of the measuring system and
analysis.’’ The real depth can be obtained with the mea-
sured depth by following steps: (1) calculate l with the
measured h and the known r by expression (8); (2)
Advances in Mechanical Engineering
(b)
(c)
calculate the angle u by expression (9) or (10); and (3)
calculate the real depth with the measured depth by
expression (11). The abovementioned steps are imple-
mented in a LabVIEW program developed in this
research.
Experimental results
To verify the measurement method, experiments were
conducted on two tires. A LabVIEW program based
on its vision module is developed in this research. The
algorithms developed are implemented in the software.
When the tire rolls over the supporting plate, the tire
groove’s number and position are found, and the depth
is calculated by the LabVIEW program. The experi-
mental results found that the system can capture the
tire tread section laser strip profile, and the algorithm
can identify the tread groove and measure its depth.
The picture of the depth gauge is shown in Figure 20,
and the measurement method using the depth gauge is
shown in Figure 21. The precision of the tire using
depth gauge is 0.01 mm, and it can satisfy the measure-
ment accuracy. The measurement method based on the
machine vision is shown in Figure 22, and the measur-
ing interface based on the machine vision is shown in
Figure 23. The measurement results from the machine
vision and the results from the depth gauge are shown
Wang et al. 11

Figure 20. The depth gauge.

Figure 22. The measurement method based on the machine

vision.

Figure 21. The measurement method using the depth gauge.

in Table 3. The measured results of the depth gauge are

the average value of the three times of measurements.
The experimental results indicated that the measure-
ment system could identify the tread groove and mea-
sure its depth automatically. The maximum percentage
error is 2.47% and the minimum percentage error is
0.41%. All the errors are less than 0.2 mm, and the test
could meet the demand of tire tread depth
measurement.

Conclusion
A new tire tread depth measurement method based on
machine vision is presented in this article. Based on the
mathematical model and the identification algorithms
developed, the measuring processing consists of image
capturing and processing and the identification and the
depth calculation of the grooves. The experiment indi-
cates that tire tread groove can be identified and the
depth can be measured. The details are as follows.
1. The measurement system developed can capture
the rolling tire’s radial section profile image.
Figure 23. The measuring interface based on the machine
vision.
The image processing and calibration can obtain
the tire’s section profile curve.
2. The tire tread groove identification method and
the depth measurement algorithm can identify
the tread groove and measure its depth. The
algorithms can be implemented in a program
developed based on LabVIEW vision module.
3. Experiment was conducted on a prototype sys-
tem. The experiment indicates that the tire tread
12 Advances in Mechanical Engineering

Table 3. The comparison of results from the machine vision and the depth gauge.

175/70R14 235/50R18
Items Machine Depth Percentage Absolute Machine Depth Percentage Absolute
vision gauge error error vision gauge error error

The number of tread 4 4 3 3

The first tire groove depth from 4.75 mm 4.80 mm 1.04% 0.05 mm 4.74 mm 4.7 mm 0.85% 0.04 mm
the left
The second tire groove depth 5.33 mm 5.41 mm 1.48% 0.08 mm 4.71 mm 4.68 mm 0.64% 0.03 mm
from the left
The third tire tread depth from 5.53 mm 5.48 mm 0.91% 0.05 mm 4.56 mm 4.45 mm 2.47% 0.11 mm
the left
The fourth tire groove depth 4.80 mm 4.82 mm 0.41% 0.02 mm
from the left

groove was identified and the depth was mea-
sured automatically. The absolute error is less
than 0.2 mm. The system can meet the demand
of tire tread depth measurement.
Declaration of conflicting interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with
respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this
article.
Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial sup-
port for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this
article: This project is supported by Science and Technology
Planning Fund of Shandong Province, China (Grant No.
2013YD03059); the National Natural Science Foundation of
China (Grant Nos 51505258 and 51775268); and the Natural
Science Foundation of Shandong province, China (Grant
No. ZR2015EL019).
ORCID iD
Ai-Juan Li https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9313-6107
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