Patent ID: 7424387

Claim:
A method of positioning a free-standing fixture relative to a vehicle, using a visual aligner system for imaging vehicle-mounted targets with reference image sensors and processing the resultant images, the method comprising: calculating locations of the vehicle-mounted targets based on the images of the targets obtained by the reference image sensors of the visual aligner system; calculating a location of a reference point on the vehicle; attaching a remote image sensor to the fixture at a predetermined mounting point on the fixture; positioning the fixture to allow imaging of one of the targets with the attached remote image sensor; calculating a location of a center of the fixture and an axis of the fixture based on an image of one of the targets obtained by the remote image sensor; determining a longitudinal line along a longitudinal axis of the vehicle using the visual aligner system; performing at least one of the steps of: comparing the intersection of the longitudinal line and the axis of the fixture with the center of the fixture; comparing the location of the center of the fixture and the location of the reference point; comparing the location of the center of the fixture and a reference plane calculated by the visual aligner; and comparing the location of the axis of the fixture and the reference plane; and adjusting the fixture relative to the vehicle to achieve a desired position or orientation of the fixture based on the performed at least one of the comparison steps.