We are currently upgrading our RTK base and rover equipment to receive and use BeiDou. The receivers are Trimble DB970 and part of the upgrade involves going to SurvCE 5, which we have done, to get the BeiDou corrections through RTCM3.2. Things seem to be working, at least when autonomous on either the base or rover they receive and use BeiDou, but when switching the rover to RTK all BeiDou show as "Satellite Used: No" on SurvCE.
I have read elsewhere on this site that most systems need 5 satellites from each constellation in order to use that constellation as part of the RTK fix, but there are some systems that can "cross" between and hence don't need this minimum.
In the attached image the rover is in RTK and it is receiving two BeiDou satellites, but is not using them for RTK fix. This was with the base and rover in the office compound so not good conditions. When in open sky we get up to 5 BeiDou, but in RTK they always are "Satellite Used: No". We are working on resolving/understanding this (it is likely to be that the update of all the firmware etc is not complete). However, as shown on the attached image, in SurvCE when we tap on the skyplot it goes to a page that shows tabs for GPS, GLONASS, Sun, and options for selecting/using satellites. Should there also be a tab for BeiDou, like the one I have sketched in red?
Hi -- I'm a programmer for SurvCE. The Beidou tab is there for some receivers. I can have a look if you tell me what version of SurvCE you are running and what receiver. You said it was a BD970 board, but I need the actual receiver manufacturer and model.
Thanks,
Sarah
Sarah, thanks, they are South S82V with SurvCE 5.03 on the controller.
Thanks for the information. I no longer have the South S82V in my inventory, but I'm going to try to get my hands on one to check it out.
It always astounds me how quickly you can get help on this site.
We have resolved the issue with BeiDou satellites not being used in a RTK fix. It requires manually starting the base station with SurvCE and reading the base station, rather than our normal procedure of just turning the base station on (we only use rover localisation for our RTK work). Not sure why this is needed but it may be that under our normal procedure the base was not sending RTCM3.2.
A BeiDou tab still does not show up in SurvCE, but we can work without that.
Excellent news. Thanks for letting me know.
Sarah Winter