Since many years ago, multilateration has been used in precision engineering notably in machine tool and coordinate measuring machine calibration. This technique needs, first, the use of laser trackers or tracking interferometers, and second, the use of nonlinear optimization algorithms to determine point coordinates. Research works have shown the influence of the experimental configuration on measure precision in multilateration. However, the impact of floating-point precision in computations on large-scale multilateration precision has not been addressed. In this work, the effects of numerical errors (rounding and cancellation effects) due to floating-point precision (number of digits) were studied. In order to evaluate these effects in large-scale multilateration, a multilateration measurement system was simulated. This protocol is illustrated with a case study where large distances (≤20 m) between pairs of target points were simulated. The results show that the use of multi-precision libraries is recommended to control the propagation of uncertainties during the multilateration computation.

自多年前以来，多边测量已用于精密工程中，尤其是在机床和坐标测量机校准中。该技术首先需要使用激光跟踪仪或跟踪干涉仪，其次需要使用非线性优化算法来确定点坐标。研究工作显示了多边测量中实验配置对测量精度的影响。但是，尚未解决浮点精度对大规模多边精度的影响。在这项工作中，研究了由于浮点精度（位数）而引起的数值误差（舍入和抵消效应）的影响。为了评估大规模多边测量中的这些影响，模拟了多边测量系统。案例研究说明了该协议，其中模拟了成对的目标点之间的较大距离（≤20 m）。结果表明，建议使用多精度库来控制多边计算中不确定性的传播。