From the Ground Up

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posted 11/12/08 by Jack Strongitharm Getting our hands dirty

So last week we decided to go and do some surveying as it is fine showing software with data but if you actually created it yourself makes all the difference. (plus I think that our data from Wigan Council has been seen quite a bit!)
Also to look more carefully at the workflow of transferring raw survey data through our survey capabilities in Civil 3D.

With the help of our colleagues at Trimble and Leica we were provided with some kit and some initial help to get us running.

So our site selection my seem a strange one when we could have gone anywhere, but Stoke Park in Guildford, Surrey in England was where we went. Why there you may ask, well we did some surveying there a couple of years ago and it was the nearest public field to Farnborough that we had other mapping data for. Its a shame!



So from Leica we had Mark Smith providing us with a TCRP 1205+ System 1200 Total Station which was a reflectorless EDM which tracked you with the survey pole and logger.


Leica Total Station 1200 Series


Mark Smith from Lecia

From Trimble we used a GPS system called R8 GNSS GPS and a TSC survey Controller


Trimble TSC Controller


Me and my bald head!


Ove in his element pushing buttons and Paul Lloyd Smith (Datech, UK)

It was amazing how quickly we did the survey, things have definitely changed since my time surveying, with mobile phone connection to OS base stations, quick coding, the total station following your every move...

Also we did a laserscan of the site with Leica and their ScanStation 2 equipment which was even quicker than us running around.


Paul Burrows from Leica HDS and his Scanstation 2


View from Leica Cyclone software

Also I put what was a 440mb ptx point file into Navisworks and created a 20mb NWD file




So in Civil 3D, using 'Trimble Link' and 'Leica X-Change' from the RAW data using Survey in Civil 3D we get all the points with coding, linework with our coding that included begin, curve type codes for automatic linework creation.

Not bad for a day and a half, especially us lot.

Many thanks to both Leica (Mark Smith, Paul Burrows and Steven Ramsey) http://www.leica-geosystems.com and

Trimble (Mark Harper, Tor-Erik Djupos) www.trimble.com

for their help and providing us with the equipment for the two days.

Jack Strongitharm

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