Simultaneous Calibration of Boresight and Lever Arm for Mobile LiDAR Systems on Hydrographic Platforms Using Synthetic and Real Data

Abstract. This work presents a robust calibration framework for marine LiDAR systems by leveraging spherical targets to jointly estimate boresight angles and lever arm offsets. The use of spheres provides a geometrically consistent and orientation-independent reference, enabling accurate calibration even in complex marine environments. To evaluate the proposed approach, a synthetic data generation algorithm was developed to simulate LiDAR scans over spherical targets, allowing controlled experiments across a wide range of sensor configurations. Furthermore, the calibration method was validated using real LiDAR data collected from a hydrographic survey vessel. Due to the calibration, the distance between the surveyed spherical centers and their estimated center positions from LiDAR point clouds is minimised to an RMS error of 0.036 m, which is within the range of the accuracy of the POS MV navigation system. We finally introduce a low cost in-house mobile LiDAR system integrating similar sensors in the ROS environment in order to address the challenges of obtaining LiDAR data in varying environmental conditions.