Rotary lasers are awesome

[bdog]

If you are in the market for a laser, take a look at this product before you buy one: ZIPLEVEL(R) PRO-2 High Precision Altimeter Replaces Rotary Lasers

I recently had some work done on my property and the contractor had one of these. The base price is less than $1000. Its amazing, and, it can be operated single handed. I was very impressed. The contractors swear by it.

That is pretty neat for certain applications. The fact that the two endpoints are connected by a cord would be a limiting factor for me. My laser has a range of 3000’. If you measure the distance you could stakeout a slope with the zip level but that would be more complicated than just setting a laser to a certain percent grade. The zip level would be pretty good for flatwork.

I didn’t buy my laser outright. It came as a part of a package deal with my machine control grader for my skid steer. I just am finding it useful for other things.

 

[TractorGuy]

On the opposite end I bought the $28 HF laser level to set up the footers for my metal barn. Fairly time consuming process with the cheap setup but when my SIL brought over a Bosch professional unit the results were exactly the same. The pro unit took about 10 minutes to set up and measure vs an hour with the cheap level.

I did have to make my own grade stick to use the HF level. That consisted of a piece of plywood for a flat base with a 2x2 screwed to it and a aluminum yard stick screwed onto that.

 

[Complete Turf Care]

I also just recently purchased the ProShot Alpha C con laser. Construction level tools - L6C laser product page

I have at least four baseball/softball fields to grade in the next few months, and this laser allows for 'cone' shaped grades. As far as I know, it is only used for construction of baseball/softball fields, and maybe running tracks. I had been borrowing one from a friend, but I felt it was worth the $2500 for me to own my own unit.

Now I can build/grade football and soccer and baseball fields and probably many other things.

 

[bdog]

The GPS grading setups are amazing but $$$. You can take the engineers design and load it right in to your machine and grade it out.