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- As someone who is in the process for studying for their FS exam, the books that have strengthened my surveying math skills the most have been Solved Surveying Problems for the FS and PS by Vansickle, Fundamentals of Surveying Practice Exam by George Cole and any version of Elementary Surveying. Instead of just going through old math books, I learn/retain information best when I see the practical application which is why I personally feel like these books are a great place to start. Whenever I come across a problem I don??t know I look at the solution in the back to help me solve it as well as watching similar problems on YouTube. Dialing down solid a a solid understanding of triangles, circles and angles would be a great start which can be achieved through the books listed above and a few good surveying YouTube channels( Todd Horton and Scott Peterson have been my 2 personal favorites).
All good suggestions for textbooks, though I prefer Hickerson for highway math.
Try abebooks.com for an older edition
Also if you can find
Land Survey Computations by Ben Buckner
Land Surveyor’s Formulas and their Application by John Keen
The Mathematics of Surveying by Ted Madson
all deal with the math of surveying and its application directly.
My wife picked this up at a garage sale about a month ago for a dollar. Lots of survey math in it. Anyone know any of these names that used the book in school? Illinois area maybe.
It is great that you have an interest in tackling the mathematical side of what we do. Depending on exactly what you end up doing in surveying it is good to understand the inner workings of how the magic answers appear on your data collector screen. For most boundary surveys the math is incredibly simplistic. Software solves most of the more complicated issues. That’s how somewhat math-ignorant types can get by. Accept what the magic box tells you and ask no questions. It must be correct…………..right?
Your experience with the upper level math could help elevate you to assisting with far more complex projects than what most of us work with. I remember reading an article in a survey mag many years ago discussing construction layout when solar heating of one side of the metal structure had to be accounted for when locating bolt holes and such. The story involved a somewhat circular stadium where bright sunlight brought on movement of key points due to the expansion of the members on that side compared to the shaded members on the other side of the stadium. As the day passed the expansion slowly moved from the east side to the south side to the west side.
I second this comment on the NCEES study materials. those books mentioned in your comment helped expose me to plenty of survey related scenarios where various math concepts were covered. It reminded me just how much I had forgotten since highschool & college. I agree that there were several scenarios where it took looking at the solution first to jog my memory on how to approach a problem before I could tackle similar problems
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