Land Surveying Equipment Questions

[Haoleguy]

I have both near and longer term need to locate, design, & map specific features on our farm fields. The most pressing is to locate underground tiling for installation this Fall on 5 acres such that it does not interfere with 33 trellis rows for grapevines next Spring. Underground irrigation pipe, electrical, water tanks, septic, etc will follow shortly after. Distances measured will range from 10 to 1000 ft. For accuracy I'm focused on buying a used total station to do the surveying so that distances, angles, and heights are more straightforward to measure. I'm a newbie to surveying equipment but I have noticed that many changes have happened since the first total station was released in the early 70s(?). The changes make it a little confusing to pick from older, used, calibrated total stations for my level of work and getting good value. Battery for better life, more onboard programs for calcs, more memory for storing projects, download adapters, laser plummet, automation drive motors, and others seem to be but a few of the changes. So I could use some guidance on what features/improvements are needed and to make sure my selection is not outdated from the start, e.g. batteries no longer available. ......Thank you, Gary

 

[cycle_gator]

Single station surveying equipment: for the older gear, you need a degree to run it, far from intuitive. Newer equipment is better but the good equipment is far from inexpensive. Buyer beware there is lots of used equipment for sale but it may be missing important parts.

My advice is to either

Hire a pro to do the initial layout marking everything with monuments, then aquire optical surveying equipment And DIY. OR

Get high quality optical equipment and a laser distance measuring device and DIY.

One caveat on all this, if you are not familiar with surveying techniques, and/or do not know how to operate a theodolite, hire a pro. The time and costs you will save by avoiding errors will be worth every dime.

 

[schmism]

One caveat on all this, if you are not familiar with surveying techniques, and/or do not know how to operate a theodolite, hire a pro. The time and costs you will save by avoiding errors will be worth every dime.

+1

surveying equipment doesnt sound like much help to you for your project. General surveying principal has you either locating existing features (property corners, were the creek goes etc) or laying out (stakeing out) new proposed features as specified on a design. Ie put the house corners here etc.

So your project for a surveyor would go like this. go out with survey equipment and pick up existing conditions and put them in the computer. eg, slopes, tree lines, fence locations etc once all that data was in a computer, someone puts your new plan on it, lays out the drain tile and then the corresponding grapes ontop as well as septic, electrical etc. Once all that info as been designed on paper (ak in the computer) then the survey guys go back out and stake out which part is being installed that day. eg the day the drain tile goes in they locate were the drain tile goes... the day the septic goes in the locate that, the day the grape structures go in they locate that. but they are working of the pre-designed plan.

In short if you have no pre-designed plan, then you might as well just start with the most important and work backward just laying the stuff out by hand on the ground. stakes and paint and a tape measure are your friend. little reason to include survey equipment for that.

 

[smstonypoint]

Because your project involves water management (tiling, irrigation), it might be worth your while to talk to the folks at your local USDA's NRCS office.

I was having erosion problems on a road on my farm, and one of the local NRCS staff laid out water bar (berm) sites for me without charge.

They may say "No," but it can't hurt to ask.

Another thought.

How far are you from Storrs? If not too far, you might want to check the UConn course catalog for any courses that teach surveying (e.g., civil engineering, ag. engineering, soil science?). You could offer the prof your farm as a case study for his/her class. He/she may say "No," but it can't hurt to ask.

Steve

 

[toddbailey]

I would advice you to hire a local surveyor to layout your system then produce you an " as-built" map showing the installed location of your system. It takes a lot of training to be able to operate surveying equipment correctly believe me it's not as easy as it looks!

 

[quicksandfarmer]

I use google earth and GPS.

 

[Haoleguy]

Thanks guys for your wisdom. Just to answer a couple of questions off the bat. Yes I have and continue to work with the NRCS on several aspects of developing my property and farming operation. Valuable folks but like other gov't agencies they run thin. They cannot respond to direct assistance within a reasonable time period but they help you navigate to a funding solution, timing is critical here, that enables an outside contractor to do the work. I'm pursuing this for irrigation design and forestry management practices. I do have a current valid survey of the property with several monuments located near where my first vineyard development and farm buildings will be. My interest in moving the direction of DIY was based on frequency need and my, and others, bad experiences with local surveyors that charge astronomical fees for very little work. However, I will be using one for establishing a valid building plan to submit to the town.

The Google Earth and GPS(common hand held units) would not give me the accuracy I need to specify systems that are within 3ft of each other. I've also moved away from a hand held EDM(like Distos) as they are range limiting and would require a separate unit for angles. That combination is appealing in some ways but that is essentially a total station except for the total station will allow for back sighting controls and thus accuracy without human error on readings.

I naively thought one sets up a TS over the monument, level it, focus scope, shoot reflector at new point with forward and reverse sighting, record X, Y, & Z, correct for tripod and pole heights on Z, and repeat from 2nd monument. The trickiest seems to be making sure you use sufficient controls to increase accuracy, rules/formulas to resolve non-concordance values, and classify accuracy. From these aspects I certainly would want to learn from someone else in a hands on environment if possible. Is it the specific instrument controls that are difficult to learn or is it something else?......Thanks, Gary

 

[sparc]

Do you have existing commodities in the ground that you need to locate? If so you might need a locator to find cables and pipes if you don't have them located already.

 

[Haoleguy]

Do you have existing commodities in the ground that you need to locate? If so you might need a locator to find cables and pipes if you don't have them located already.

No. Nothing inside my property lines yet but a transformer on pad sits just outside where my driveway enters. ...Gary

 

[quicksandfarmer]

I think you're overthinking this.

You say you have 5 acres and the maximum dimension is 1,000 feet. Five acres is 215,000 square feet, so the other dimension is 215 feet. Those are distances well within the capabilities of stakes and strings. On Google Earth I can easily pinpoint a rock, tree or stump that is a foot across, and I can zoom in with reasonable clarity so that 1/4"=1 foot. Plot out your plan using Google Earth, then go out there with stakes and strings and mark where you want things to go.

You're pretty close to me, and I can tell you that nothing underground is going to go exactly where you want it to go anyway, the soil is too rocky. You'll go to dig a hole for a trellis post and find that 18" down is a rock the size of a desk. You'll be asking for trouble if your plan relies on everything going in exactly the right spot. You need to have a plan that allows you to put things +/- a couple of feet depending on what you encounter. Nothing you've described requires great precision.