Sorry, I tried to upload the video to the forum but it fails even though I shorted the video and changed resolution to get it below the 512mb limit, so I uploaded it to my YouTube account instead.
Hard to record video while running the joystick, so it's kind of a painful video to watch.I apologize in advance..but basically I can get it pointed close enough that I see one or the other guidelight. The joystick responds erratically so I can't always get it close enough to see both lights flash when it's pointed directly at me. If I do get lucky and get it that close sometimes it will get a lock by itself and other times I still have to search.
In this case I had it pointed close but not perfect and you will see how long it took to acquire a lock. I would normally have given up on the joystick sooner and hit search but I was attempting to catch the erratic behavior on camera, plus the error it occasionally shows up in the top right corner where the angles and distance display "instrument failed to turn" or something to that affect. Earlier this morning I saw it pop up for a second a couple of times even though nothing obvious was going wrong at that time?ÿ
I cut off the first 40 seconds of trying to joystick it so you wouldn't hear my cursing under my breath.?ÿ
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> "instrument failed to turn"
You should NOT be getting that message.
That's the instrument failing to respond to a command or returning with a 'failed' message.
Could be the instrument radio or the turn servos a physical obstruction (icing maybe?)
@jimcox?ÿ
No ice, just a little bit of snow that melted right away this morning.... however I did put the little rubber lens guard on to keep the water off the lens (and turned off auto F1/f2) this morning...so it's possible it tried to randomly look at the ground or the sky and couldn't? It doesn't do that very often and I didn't notice it do it today so I kind of doubt it.?ÿ
Separate issue but right now I'm trying to find a way to get the touchscreen to start responding again. It's been doing it more and more frequently (second time today) but the first time it cleared up while I was checking the task manager which didn't show anything unusual, however most of the physical keys except the letters seemed to be doing random things. I was just trying to type something alphanumeric and it wasn't having it, then I realized the touchscreen also wasn't working.
?ÿSo it fixed itself while I was typing this message. Seems like if you just leave it for about 3-5 minutes it's okay again. Very bizarre behavior and I feel like I'm more experienced than the average person with computer issues.?ÿ
> "instrument failed to turn"
You should NOT be getting that message.
That's the instrument failing to respond to a command or returning with a 'failed' message.
Could be the instrument radio or the turn servos a physical obstruction (icing maybe?)
@jimcox?ÿ
Radio issue sounds plausible, one day early afternoon it stopped connecting, kept on "attempting to connect by cable" until I got home and found a screwdriver to remove the radio and installed it in the other slot. Then it would connect and has ever since, although it seems very slow to connect, it seems the same as the other Trimble robots.?ÿ
It did completely fail to connect to the sx12 the other day both wifi and LR radio so I gave up and switched back to the s5.?ÿ
Sounds like there might be a spec of dirt stuck somewhere around the edge of the screen. Been using an S5 with a T7 for a couple years with 0 issues. ?ÿ
I'll inspect it closer tomorrow morning. I do clean the screen every now and then as needed.
The Panasonic tablet I used the last few years never gave me any issues as far as the screen, except in moderate rain, but it was still usable. It didn't really have any gap anywhere around the screen for dirt to buildup.?ÿ
I actually didn't have any issues with it today and I was doing a topo all day long. It was however a fresh job with no upload or DXF. Started with 0 points and ended up with a couple hundred by the end of the day. So it wasn't exactly working hard. I did still have issues with the joystick and slow search. It also couldn't find the 360 prism I had setup about 300 meters away, I had to sight it in manually. Wasn't a big deal because I was right there and could do it myself but I didn't expect it to have issues locking onto a prism at that distance, when I had sited it in perfectly so it was already pointed at it.?ÿ
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stupid question (because when I was using Trimble my rep walked me off this cliff a few times....) are your Windows updates current??ÿ seriously, I'm as shocked as you are reading that, but it's a plausible issue. esp since they recently released the new "crapsess" version. I'm not really jealous, I'm just learning to master my TS15 and captivate now....
I did diagnose the dying EDM from the Leica discussion here and evidence.?ÿ?ÿ
This sites still kicks much A$$!!!!
also.?ÿ the Trimble antennas get damaged and worn out easily.?ÿ I know you've mentioned your crews like to get a little western and Trimble is kinda meh when the going gets tough.
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(I absolutely don't miss the yellow MFB...I promise...)
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I tried to avoid windows updates until they've been out for a long while. I've uninstalled or disabled all the useless crap like Cortana that I don't need on there, which did help performance.?ÿ
Did they replace your EDM or did you get a different robot??ÿ
new EDM module.?ÿ TS 15 is a huge jump up from the Trcp1203 I was using.
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fun time!
I know one crew has broken an antenna. I always take mine off before it goes back in the truck, cause I'm afraid of it catching on something. It doesn't look rugged at all. But I'm pretty sure it's not a problem so far. Range hasn't been an issues at least for a few hundred meters that I've used it at.?ÿ
I was able to go about 1500 ft before I had issues and realized that the idea is to have a Rodman running around with a radio and stay next to the not taking shots.
But that's not the singlean set up the industry making equipment wants us to use, unless you're using a Leica.... ???? ??? ?????ÿ
Ok some of that behavior is crazy. Question do you hit the green key to power off daily? Or do you go to shut down in the start menu? The angle issue i had and it kept ?ÿgetting worse as a matter of fact it finally crapped out doing measure rounds once. The display on the TSC7 showed the gun was turning angles but the gun was not moving at all. That ended up being some dust over tge glass diode inside the gun itself. Whats bad is it had just been in one month prior for clean and calibration. But they only clean the outside at dealership which ticked me off. So if your tsc7 starts showing angles moving and you know the gun itself is not that might be the cause.?ÿ
The joystick thing and random touch screen issues and such i have seen several times. I was new to the TSC7 and did not know that hitting the green button only placed the dc in sleep mode. Once I started powering off shutting down the tsc7 over lunch if i did take one but especially at night after downloading files i had less issues. But a closing of Trimble access and restarting windows i guess is like a reboot. I am no computer wiz but my better half use to just close the laptop instead of shutting it down and when I would get on it I always had to reboot to get it to work correctly. So I started doing the same thing with the TSC7. ?ÿ
It also could be dirt or something going wonky with screen cover as well. I notice sometimes that it would switch between finger stylis and glove mode on its own or gremlins did it.?ÿ
the next thing I would suggest is buy an atari joystick and wire that puppy in. Those things were built to last. I know we beat each other with them through them across the room. Slammed them down and they always worked. ?ÿNow I never had one but my cousin and friend did and they took more of a beating than the joystick i was given. It was a solid hickory handle on a maul for busting firewood. I prayed daily that sucker would break. Lol.?ÿ
hope this helps. I would be sending that video to the Trimble support saying what is causing this. ?ÿOh on your instrument when you do replace the antenna. Make sure you get the short stubby one not the one that does the 90 degree bend like on the data collector. It will last much longer on the instrument than the taller 90 degree bend ones. I think they are like $10 extra and our dealer never has them in stock. So i just order them and have it shipped. ?ÿI keep one extra in instrument case and one extra for tsc7 or tsc5 or tsc3 in its case.?ÿ
I wish I'd gotten to try a newer Leica for longer than the 20 minutes I got with a ts16. As it is I feel like I was spoiled by the Tcrp1203+. If I could have that robot, but working perfect with access and integrated surveying, it would be like a dream. As much as access drives me nuts on a regular basis it would be hard to go back to fieldgenius now that I'm used to integrated surveying, and being able to multitask like jump into the point manager or inverse screen etc while I'm in the middle of something important, even taking a long GNSS shot. Also I started using measure codes and it made the topo a lot more efficient today.?ÿ
God....you had to say that....
I had a 900 shot topo day the other day with the captivate kludge. I definitely miss the yellow Codes pages.?ÿ I probably could have walked off 1500 shots, not open field but TBC fl bldg DR etc etc.?ÿ sigh.?ÿ I'll miss that always.?ÿ but the green is a better shooter, follows like a secret service agent.... ?????ÿ
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I actually power down windows completely in between every job I go to. Battery power is not there to be wasted on a tsc7 so I don't want it idling while I drive to the next job. At a bare minimum it gets powered off once a day (like today when I used it all day).?ÿ
Today my project manager and I went a couple hours out of town for a big topo today. We split up with him running base and rover and I ran the robot. The second data collector which my project manager borrowed from the office (is brand new and only used a couple of times so far, by a part office/part field guy who is gentle with equipment) was stuck in access with measure codes stuck on the screen and couldn't be closed, when I tried to power everything down.?ÿ
I ended up connecting to the server and downloading the job before force closing it just in case it corrupted the job or something. Seems like with Trimble there is always something wrong.?ÿ
Yeah fieldgenius didn't have anything that slick for quick topo shots either.?ÿ
I saved a lot of time with them today but then I also wasted a lot of time, clumsily switching out the active prism for my peanut prism for a bunch of building corners of a dome (sand pit), and then walking back to each corner and staking it out roughly with the active prism just to make sure it didn't shoot my vest or something else instead of the peanut prism. With the Leica I would have shot each corner reflectorless and if I did have to shoot some with the peanut I knew it wasn't going to lock on my vest anyway.?ÿ
It all depends on what you're doing which machine will be the least cumbersome to use.?ÿ
@350rocketmike wow. Yeah those things eat the batteries. Trimble had it mad when they made their own operating system in the TSC1. ?ÿThat thing never locked up. But it only had a few functions. ?ÿAnd only ran the rtk equipment lol. Windows 10 is crap. It??s crap on my home computer work computer. The whole agile scrum of making coders and developers flexible to challenges also makes quality bad. I was agile and scrum trained and i am no coder but I needed to understand that and cmmi so I could help track quality of software for dod. I was on a team. One of the other things i did besides survey. Quality went down but the latest and greatest super clicky app was so much more exciting. ?ÿI figure Trimble is doing the same thing. I actually had a issue today and i called in a favor. And the Trimble friend said what are you breaking now lol. Anyway we figured it out. This was a TBC glitch. I try not to bother them but i could not figure out what had gone wrong. Darn computers. Lol.?ÿ
i kept two tsc7 batteries charging in the cradle and two on dc and hot swapped during the day on the last couple weeks i burned through them thank goodness i was always charging one. I had 3 tsc7 and a tsc3 running on the job two days. I was running from crew to crew with a thumb drive keeping them going. Contractor finally slowed down some. Thanksgiving is coming and Christmas and he is pushing people hard to get done. Picture a 100 acre area and laying a big wagon wheel in the middle. Thats how they were working from middle out in all directions and they had different crews for different things. I would literally shoot a hundred foot to as built a section. And as soon as i gave a thumbs up they dumped material and spread. Then back again in another spot lol. Good luck man technology glitches stink.?ÿ
