Patent ID: 7784195

Claim:
A method of displaying contours of a surface of a bearing rotatable about an axis, the method comprising the steps of: measuring each of a plurality of points on the surface of the bearing at a plurality of angular positions about the axis to determine a plurality of measured values; normalizing the plurality of measured values at each of a plurality of angular positions about the axis to determine a normalized measurement datum at each of the plurality of angular positions; subtracting the normalized measurement datum from each of the plurality of measured values to determine a plurality of deviations corresponding to each of the plurality of points; assigning a different shade to each of a range of possible deviations; displaying each of the plurality of deviations as a data segment on a grid representing the shape of the surface of the bearing; and displaying each data segment on the grid as a shade that corresponds to the value of each of the plurality of deviations to provide a topographical representation of the contours of the surface of the bearing.