US Patent 7784194 Portable coordinate measurement machine

A portable coordinate measurement machine (CMM) is disclosed. The CMM may include a manually positionable articulated arm having opposed first and second ends and a measurement probe attached to the first end articulated arm. The arm may include a plurality of jointed arm segments. Each arm segment may include at least one position transducer for producing a position signal. The CMM may also include an electronic circuit that receives the position signals from the transducers and provides a digital coordinate corresponding to the position of the probe in a selected volume. At least one of the arm segments may be non-linear along its length.