Patent ID: 7227328

Claim:
A method for detecting a possible collision of at least two objects movable with respect to each other by simulating an intended relative motion of the objects, comprising: (a) assigning to at least one of the objects an inner envelope that surrounds the object and an outer envelope that surrounds the inner envelope; (b) traversing a path line that represents the relative motion of the objects in steps of a selected, first step size; (c) during the step (b), detecting whether an overlap of the objects occurs to ascertain a possible collision of the objects, the outer envelope of at least one object used as a datum for detecting the overlap of the objects; (d) if an overlap is detected in the step (c) in a segment of the path line, re-traversing the segment of the path line using a second step size smaller than the first step size; (e) during the step (d), detecting whether an overlap of the objects occurs, the inner envelope of at least one object used as a datum for detecting the overlap of the objects.