Here is one on ebay:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/K-E-survey-equipment-vintage-/111101383671?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item19de2893f7
I have an autoranger S model.
It seems so long ago, when dad excitedly took us out to a mountain at 5:00 in the morning, Just south of Oakhurst California, and we got to watch a top mount EDM shoot a distance. It would not shoot it, during the hot part of the day, due to heat waves. It got it just as soon as it was light enough to see, and the fog had burnt off, just a little. I think it was an HP edm.
Nate
> Here is one on ebay:
>> http://www.ebay.com/itm/K-E-survey-equipment-vintage-/111101383671?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item19de2893f7
>
> I have an autoranger S model.
>
> It seems so long ago, when dad excitedly took us out to a mountain at 5:00 in the morning, Just south of Oakhurst California, and we got to watch a top mount EDM shoot a distance. It would not shoot it, during the hot part of the day, due to heat waves. It got it just as soon as it was light enough to see, and the fog had burnt off, just a little. I think it was an HP edm.
>
> Nate
Used one just like that in the late 1980s (when I was just a kid working on my dad's crew). The original batteries never worked so we just hooked it up to the truck battery with alligator clips. You just had to make sure that you could drive up to all of your setup points. As I remember, it was very touchy. Had to push a couple of buttons then work the horizontal and vertical tangent screws to maximize the signal then hit another button to start the measurement. It would then tick like a clock for several seconds and if all was right with the world it would give you the distance.
Thanks for jogging my memory
After maximizing signal:
1st Hit CALIBRATE. (whizzing noise follows)
Then RANGE. (click----click----click click click click)
Slope distance is displayed.
It's a trip down memory lane!
N
That was first-class stuff! I had a Geodimeter Model 6 that you had to separately null each of the 3 frequencies, write it all onto a form and then go back into the office, key-punch the IBM cards, load it into the mini-computer and then get the 132-column printer to print out the slope distance.
Whew! All that for one distance ... easier than chaining it, though.
Not since 1981..... but the crews used to argue about who got to use it!
First place I worked surveying in 1979 had two of them, neither had the scope for sighting though, might of been an option? There were several models of the Autoranger, this one looks to be the standard one (probably the original model I would guess) the "S" model had a lot longer range and the model II had an on board horseshoe shaped battery, those flimsy cables were a failure point and the batteries didn't last too long either. Occasionally they would give a bogus distance too, I mean really bogus, +/- 0.1' was pretty normal if you weren't careful. I shot a distance off of a picture window once that was behind the prism, took a bit of head scratching to chase that bust down!
The "S" model was pretty hot for the day, we later had a Nikon NTD-4 (manual TS) that shot real good distances, BUT it didn't have the range of the "S" which seemed to go forever with more glass, the Nikon went so far and then no amount of glass would help. I think the "S" model would do at least 8000 feet maybe more?
One winter we were running ownership lines for logging unit boundaries in Western Oregon, I remember there were a few shots so steep that you couldn't tilt the yolk mounted Autoranger enough to get the shot, yes it sucked, especially in pouring down rain!
SHG
Oh yes the old model 6 with a visible light beam. If you wanted to operate one at Drexel and Barrel (Boulder, CO) you showed up Saturday morning on your own time to spend a few hours at Chautauqua Park to learn its operation. Then later and also on your own time you might learn how to reduce the shots. I remember when you acquired the prism you could see the light through the scope and the expression was "fire in the hole". Another somewhat complicated EDM system I learned to work with were the E tapes ... those suckers could shoot clear across a county (it seemed like) I remember interrogate and respond. Pretty good voice comms too. Oh the so called good old days
Not an Autoranger
But I did use a Microranger in ~1974. It totally destroyed a perfectly good T1. It didn't mount on the standards but atop the telescope barrel. Within a year the bearings(?) in the vertical were shot and couldn't be adjusted. It had a separate controller that hung from the IM's shoulder and was connected to the EDM by a cable. It as pretty good for distances but not worth the cost of a new T1.
Andy
It was a Beetle, that dad showed me the 1st time, out south of Oakhurst. That post jogged me brain....
Thanks for the trip down memory lane.
N
In about 1970 my Dad was driving the company owned Ford Galaxy 500 on Highway 41 north bound to Oakhurst when another vehicle, a Buick or Pontiac station wagon (the one with the little upper windshield on the roof) ran a stop sign on a side road.
I distinctly remember my mother saying, "Charlie, he's not stopping!" My Dad locked up the brakes and we plowed into the side of the other car. No one was hurt. My Dad insisted that everyone in our family wear seatbelts which was unusual at that time.
The car was replaced with a 1971 lime green Ford Maverick coup. A lady making an illegal u turn in Bakersfield t boned the car. It was repaired. His coworkers started calling him crash 'em up Karoly. That and the Cessna 182 he broke the nose wheel scissor gear on takeoff from a dirt strip at Templeton Meadows and landed in the dirt at Meadows Field collapsing the nose wheel.
We got one without the sight in about 1982 or 1983 on a powerplant project. The salesman showed us how to peg the needle to get it properly sighted. I asked if it would give a bad distance if you didn't and he said no. The next day I proved him wrong. We measured 100 feet and setup the prism. Turning it as far as we could one way gave us 99.78 and as far as we could the other way gave us 100.19
James
> We got one without the sight in about 1982 or 1983 on a powerplant project.
Yeah, the scope that our AutoStranger came with was a rifle scope! As best I can recall, about the best you could do was remember how far off the center of the cross hairs in the telescope the EDM axis was and aim to miss the target by that amount.
Fortunately, none of the theodolites we had at the time had EDM lugs on them, so the unit got mounted on the one and only piece of Topcon equipment I've ever used, a boat anchor of an azimuth base that looked as if some shop class at Tokyo High School was making them to learn how to machine metal.
The weak point in the AutoStranger was that it took a pretty heavy touch to trigger the measurement and if you weren't careful it would shift the instrument off the target. The long range EDM's that K&E made like the Rangers III and IV solved that problem by using an electrical contact to trigger the measurement. Just barely touching your finger to it set things in motion.
