Activity Feed › Discussion Forums › Strictly Surveying › Trimble SX10-any reviews
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What’s the maintenance regime for scanning guns like the SX-10 and the MS60? They’re so jam-packed with motors and mirrors and sensors that I wonder if they require more frequent (and expensive!) shop time than a conventional robot.
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McRey, post: 441227, member: 12937 wrote: While not trying to be a smart alec, I know what the specs say, but also know real world experience is something all together different. I’m looking for experiential information, not spec sheet information.
Supposedly the accuracy of the scans is the same as the accuracy of the reflectorless shots, which is part of the appeal. As I understand it the scanning uses the same beam with a spinning mirror such as what dedicated scanners use. From my experience, this is born out by the results I’ve seen. The data isn’t noisy or fuzzy, and when the instrument is resected from the same control points at each setup the scans align beautifully without the need for any registration.
As far as eye safety, I’m going to go out on a limb and say what Trimble states on the spec sheet is reliable. And in any case I have no future plans of staring down the barrel.
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Jim Frame, post: 441259, member: 10 wrote: What’s the maintenance regime for scanning guns like the SX-10 and the MS60? They’re so jam-packed with motors and mirrors and sensors that I wonder if they require more frequent (and expensive!) shop time than a conventional robot.
That’s a good point; I guess we’re fixing to find out. Another good point is will our local dealer be able to fully support it or will it have to go to Trimble for any repairs? Typically Trimble wants all failed instruments to come back to them for the first six months to a year after a new product is introduced so that they can identify their problems and create engineering fixes for them.
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Just to update this – the one thing I miss from using an S6 is the MT1000. The SX10 only has passive tracking, and you have to be very careful about making sure you’re locked onto the prism. I had two incidents last week where I took shots on something other than my prism; on the first I crossed my backsight and took ten shots to it while cross sectioning a road. Luckily we didn’t really need those points, because I didn’t catch it in the field. The second time I was foresighting a point where I wanted to set up and take a scan; when I set up on it and backsighted I was 31 feet off. In that instance I shot direct and reverse to my backsight prism to get a good distance and delta height, then took the average of two VRS observed control points after the scan was complete to get azimuth. That was easier than re-occupying the first point.
I’ve had incredibly good results using Integrated Surveying to resect the instrument in; that’s just wayyyy too easy. And something I inadvertently discovered last week that is way cool is that if you leave the R10 on the prism you still see the E-bubble even when topoing with the SX10. What this means is that I can put the EDM in tracking, give the rod to the other crew member, and just hit Store on the Tablet when the bubble goes green. This would of course be true with any Trimble robot using an R10 for IS but it made getting topo around a building a breeze.
The ability to switch from reflectorless to robotic to scanning to RTK, and have the RTK and robot interact in real time is extremely powerful. Other than the above mentioned passive tracking issues, the SX10 has been a great gun so far.
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Lee D, post: 447619, member: 7971 wrote: I was foresighting a point where I wanted to set up and take a scan; when I set up on it and backsighted I was 31 feet off. In that instance I shot direct and reverse to my backsight prism to get a good distance and delta height, then took the average of two VRS observed control points after the scan was complete to get azimuth.
Do you have any idea what it took the shot on? I’ve sat on the side of the highway all day and never seen it lock on to anything but the prism it sort of blew my mind that it didn’t wander. I can’t get mine to take a shot without locking on a prism (maybe the autolock toggle). Monday we were trying to shoot a peanut prism that was too far and we could see the yellow pole and the orange on the prism but couldn’t get it to measure. I finally went and found a bigger prism and put it on to get the shot. Distance was 980 feet
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I wonder if it would be technically unfeasible for Trimble to give active tracking to the SX10.
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I don’t know what it was but I’m assuming it was a tail light. I was set up on a sidewalk about 6 feet from the curb and the foresight was straight down the sidewalk; when I looked at the azimuth delta it was to the road side of the prism.
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My dealer said that Trimble says there’s not room for it, but I’m sure that if it’s possible they’ll figure out a way.
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It was my last setup, I was hot and tired and sore (summer decided to make a cameo appearance), and I got lazy. But I learned from it and you can bet I’ll never shoot a foresight again without zooming in tight enough to make sure of what I’m aimed at.
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I ordered an SX10 this week, not sure how long it will take to be delivered, they were apparently backed up quite a bit but I think that has settled down.
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Ours took literally months but I think they’re getting better. A lot of the work I did was with a loaner from the dealer, ours finally came in.
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For those that have the experience, I would appreciate a comparison of general robotic total station function between the SX-10 and say a TCRP 1200 series. The tracking, the finding of a lost prism, the overall robotic to rod functionality, compared to the 1200 with Carlson Not to get into the Ford/Chevy thing and not considering the other features of this pretty amazing technology. how does it work as a robot in the bush? Thanks much!
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I have a Leica P50 in my assigned stable of equipment. It is an incredible machine, but it can’t use prisms (faster) and Cyclone produced by Leica GEOsystems is not geodetic software, it is SF 1.000 flat earth software.
The advantage I can see of the SX10 (which we have only demo’d) is it is a TS so can turn sets to prisms and it can scan and it can take regular sideshots so the efficiency would be in combining operations.
a former coworker has used one at Caltrans regularly and loves it.
it can do a medium density full dome scan and photos in about the same amount of time as the P50, scanning being a lot slower but the photos are much faster.
Trimble is moving to feeding everything into TBC which is real geodetic software. Everything is just Survey data. I like that.
TBC has improved quite a bit. I was able to process 7 miles of closed traverse with 1.5 miles of cross ties in TBC in about a day, I thought it would take me a week. And it worked. It blew the doors off of StarNet, finally. Easier to edit data and identify sets to turn off (I do 4 minimum at every traverse point, sometimes 5 if the residuals look loose).
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I have a TCU I can attach to the S7 but I prefer a separate DC especially in the woods. Some of the steep setups it’s too difficult to constantly chase the DC around the tripod.
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The tracking on the SX10 is pretty amazing for a passive prism, but I believe its uses the excellent video capabilities for tracking in addition to the EDM.
I would not make it primarily a bush gun, but it is a 1″ total station after all and can hang with the rest of the S-series. It is rather heavy by comparison, so take that into consideration.
It really shines in civil survey applications, though. Busy urban or suburban areas. Great for scanning unsafe areas, complex areas, or maybe just a building facade for the architects.
I miss it a lot. I loved running integrated survey with it – tell it to scan something while I go take some RTK observations or buzz up some monuments, or just take notes. If I had good conditions and a decent setup I would simply scan hardscape, extract the ground in TBC (the automated classification is pretty damned good) and then sample at five or ten foot intervals. Super easy and I didn’t have to walk back and forth for a couple of hours. Sometimes I would just scan the whole site and then place my survey points in the office. The camera is fantastic for project documentation. I would set mine up to automatically snap an image of the backsight and of the setup point (using the plummet camera).
The resection routine in an integrated survey is awesome. Orient the SX10 with some (well-placed) RTK shots, make some scans, and they will come into TBC oriented to the project datum. Skip the traverse, and no cloud registration necessary.
The biggest problem with the SX10…is that most folks don’t take advantage of it. Some of our offices use Trimble, others Leica, and 99% of the crews just cannot wrap their heads around the workflow or its capabilities. It’s not entirely their fault, as they don’t really know the office side of things and thus can’t always discern when to scan or not, or to what detail, etc.
And the office people tend to be afraid of the learning curve associated with scanning, or just don’t know TBC well enough to use it. Or they just tell the crews not to bother with it to “save time”.
“…people will come to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think.” -Neil Postman -
Also it fits in a standard instrument backup which is a big advantage for remote scanning jobs.
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You’re comparing a ten year old plus instrument to something brand new. I’d say the newer gun is going to track/search better. But….this shouldn’t be the comparison. Maybe the Robot ability of the TS16 (still cheaper) and the Robot only ability of the SX10.
Personally I think most are buying the SX10 for the cool factor. I say that because I feel the S7 is much better for robotic only surveying. If a company that wants to truly make scanning a profit center for there business wouldn’t be looking at a hybrid instrument. They would be getting a full blown scanner.
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