Trimble R12 GNSS Receiver

Great, we just bought a new R10-2 system a few months ago and its already out of date.?ÿ?ÿ

@david-livingstone

That sucks. Definitely worth a call to the sales rep. They should have told you it was coming. These things don’t drop out of the sky. 

Enhanced precision under canopy, enhanced radio range, enhanced ability to remove $80,000 from your wallet, etc.

FWIW I can tell from the accent that Scotty, in that second video, is a New Zealander, probably South Island.

@richard-imrie

Trimble do have a development base in Christchurch, New Zealand

11-15 Birmingham Dr, Middleton, Christchurch 8024

@kotuku4

Yes, but they don't do receiver hardware here - they come out if the states.

I'm all for it. Technology is moving along.

N

@kotuku4

According to online info, he appears to be BSurv Uni of Otago NZ circa 2011, then Beca Christchurch NZ, then Boulder USA, then Trimble Westminster CO USA - which is where I assume the big elevations are in his demo.

@david-livingstone

Hi David.

The hardware of R12 is the same of?ÿ R10-2. If you want you can update your R10-2 with the new RTK engine (It will cost some money). If you do that your r10-2 will have the exact same perfomances of the R12.?ÿ

PS- most certain you sales rep didn't know that a new GNSS was coming when he sold that to you. In many cases sales guys that are in the field just know about new products releases one week before costumers.

@richard-imrie

That is correct - a lot of the tutorials/demos that they put out for Trimble Business Center are using data gathered at that office park in Westminster or in the surrounding area.

One of the reasons I like TBC is because development is done right here in the States (I think TBC is actually developed in California), and many of their development folks are licensed surveyors and/or have formal education in geomatics disciplines, rather than computer science and statistics. I met several Canadians with advanced geomatics degrees when I did some training in Westminster. Makes for much more user-friendly software.

As far as the R12 goes, I am impressed that they have already developed a new RTK engine. HD-GNSS was already a big step forward, but even as a fan of Trimble I am a little skeptical as to whether the new gear will be worth the extra scratch. Unfortunately we are not a Trimble shop, so I will have to try and wrangle a demo from the local dealer...

Looking forward to hearing some test-driving stories on here!

@zyx

I can attest to that.  Trimble sales reps found out just a day or two before you guys did that this was coming.

Posted by: @zyx

The hardware of R12 is the same of?ÿ R10-2. If you want you can update your R10-2 with the new RTK engine (It will cost some money). If you do that your r10-2 will have the exact same perfomances of the R12.

Ok, so according to Trimble, the "RTK engine, is software".

Hmmm.

N

@nate-the-surveyor

Correct, all RTK Engines are "software". The number of channels and GNSS systems a unit can track has nothing to do with how the system performance. Leica came up with something similar when they came out with the GS16. The antennas look identical to the GS14 except for the color, but the measuring engine is different. Leica claims "improved sensitivity, Intelligent management of multi-frequency, multi-constellation signals, Intelligent selection to automatically reject, reflected or noisy signals" blah blah blah blah ???? ... It does work better then the GS14 to the point that it deserved a new model name. I suspect this is similar to the R10 to R12 difference. I'm excited to see how good the R12 tracks, competition is good! 

Will also add that as a dealer. Manufactures never tell us when something is coming out. However most manufactures are on a development cycle and you can usually infer when something should be coming. 

@rover83

Can also attest to this.?ÿ The Leica tech rep out of the GTA I spoke with went to the same university geomatics program I did.?ÿ The "big boys" do cost more, but they do have great support.?ÿ?ÿ

I'm pretty happy with the way the R10's perform.?ÿ Our system, which can be base/rover, base/rover with a high power radio, or VRS was pretty pricey, I can't imagine them letting me spend any money to upgrade it.

@david-livingstone

I asked and was given a tentative price of $1500 per unit to upgrade R10-2 to R12.  Not bad in the grand scheme of things.  I'm already hugely impressed with the R10-2's performance in heavy canopy. I've already told my salesman that we're going to the woods for a side by side comparison of R10-2 vs R12 as soon as he gets a set.

Posted by: @zyx

The hardware of R12 is the same of?ÿ R10-2. If you want you can update your R10-2 with the new RTK engine (It will cost some money).

A bit off-topic, but this reminds me of the time when Ashtech came out with a kinematic firmware upgrade for the PM-2.?ÿ I decided that the additional performance might justify the $750-per-receiver price for the upgrade, so I upgraded two of them.?ÿ About a week later a bug in the original firmware was discovered that rendered the receivers essentially non-functional (something to do with EGNOS signals), and Ashtech's bandaid was to release the kinematic firmware at no charge, since it wasn't affected by the bug.?ÿ I cried foul, having just shelled out $1500 for something now available for free.?ÿ It took a bit of persistence, but we eventually reached an agreement in which I got an L2 processing key for Ashtech solutions as compensation.

@stephen-ward

My sales rep said he gets the final prices for the R12 in a week. 

preliminary prices:

25,500  retail for the R12

R10-2 with the firmware up-grade to match the R12 performance will be discounted to $19,500

I tried an R12 in the woods side by side with an R10 (older model R10). I had tested the R10 last summer under full foliage on a accurately surveyed point and was impressed with how well it did when you have multiple constellations at both the base (Alloy) and rover (R10) when the base is nearby (<500 meters).?ÿ

I had a limited amount of time to test, and it was leaf-off conditions, but what I noticed was that the R12 right away got more SV's than the R10 and initialized faster. After that they seemed to be comparable.?ÿ?ÿ

Hopefully I will get to test it some more soon.?ÿ