Tire appearance inspection apparatus and method

摘要

A tire appearance inspection apparatus (1) and method employing image processing is capable of performing tire appearance inspection with great accuracy. The tire appearance inspection apparatus includes a sectional shape acquiring means (10) for acquiring cross-sectional shapes of a tire in the radial direction along the circumference of the tire, an arc fitting means (31) for fitting an arc to each of the cross-sectional shapes, an arc center position calculating means (32) for calculating the center positions of the arcs, and a sectional shape aligning means for aligning the cross-sectional shapes using the center positions of the arcs for the cross-sectional shapes.