Norman Oklahoma, post: 340353, member: 9981 wrote: Sections that were done by the "3 mile method" were subdivided by the GLO by running lines east-west across the section from 1/16th to 1/16th corner, and from E1/4 corner to W1/4 corner (ie/ 3 extra miles). 3 mile sections are common in Oklahoma. Could be your friends are thinking of those and getting confused.
That is a good point, I wonder if there is a bit of a discussion about those types of sections......
We do have a few in the neighborhood, the surveyor here only ran the 1/16ths along the north and south lines, then along the east-west centerline.
He called the corners 1/8th corners and marked the stones with a 1/8.
Norman Oklahoma, post: 340353, member: 9981 wrote: Sections that were done by the "3 mile method" were subdivided by the GLO by running lines east-west across the section from 1/16th to 1/16th corner, and from E1/4 corner to W1/4 corner (ie/ 3 extra miles). 3 mile sections are common in Oklahoma. Could be your friends are thinking of those and getting confused.
However, that method is not in any manual and is more than likely "special instructions". But even regardless of that, I think that schools should more emphasize the following of the original notes and township plats, because if they did not follow the rules of the manual that were in place at the time, we must use the notes over the instructions. (also, that method (the three-mile method) does not involve the intersection of 1/16th lines, but is a east-west proportionate method as you state.) The students are wrong, probably due to inexperience more than due to not being intelligent.
MightyMoe, post: 340004, member: 700 wrote: The two engineers argued with me, the surveying student said my way made more sense to him.
[sarcasm] That's because engineers already know so much that there isn't possibly anything useful that they could learn from a mere surveyor, but the surveyor is still ignorant enough to be teachable.
I hope that I keep forgetting some of the stuff I learned in college so that I can maintain enough ignorance to learn and retain information that is actually useful to my practice.
[/sarcasm]
I don't recall ever seeing a textbook that taught such a method for section breakdown. My guess is that they each forgot a step since having been taught the process, or they were taught by someone with a doctorate in geospatial positioning but only a summer or two of experience on a leveling crew somewhere.