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Mining: Where are the hole and the drill? Both ex post
facto measurements and real-time control of the drill head are needed.
Today’s magnetometer/inclinometer basedinstrumentation for measurement
of drilled bore holes is useless when casing is present and when the rock
contains magnetic minerals.
Machine control: The civil engineering business is the
world largest industry, but the least automated. Today companies have
started to build systems that utilize GPS to control construction
machinery. They experience problems with resolution, dynamics, etc., that
can be resolved with inertial measurement systems.
Surveying in the building and construction industry:
Measurement of foundations, buildings, etc., are needed in places where
GPS is not available. This has the potential to become a huge market.
Dynamic measurement tools: For development of products
in the automotive and other industries it is important to get feed-back
for simulation tools and models. For example, it is difficult to measure
all motions of crash dummies with cameras due to limited lines of sight.
It is hard for the cameras to measure acceleration, which is the most
important parameter for biological damage. It would also be useful to
measure how the chassis deforms during a collision to get feed-back for
FEM simulations, for example.
Unmanned vehicles and navigation aids: In the future
forestry, agriculture, fork lifts, airplanes, etc, will all use IMUs as
input devices for guidance to some extent. The use of IMUs for guidance
of vehicles in forestry and agriculture is especially interesting where
they can be employed for selectively making different measurements. This
may be a very fast growing market.
The emergency services: Guidance for firemen inside
buildings, police squads during operations, rescue teams, etc, are
possible market.