I thought the other topic; longest shot with a total station, was interesting but it's all conventional instruments shooting a backsight.?ÿ
It reminded me that I had been wondering how far could you shoot with a robot by yourself? I never once got beyond the range of the RC unit on the Sokkia robots (at least once the defective RC unit was replaced under warranty on our ix), but I've probably only been 350-400m away for a backsight the odd time. The majority of my work since becoming a party chief is construction layout and backsights longer than 150m are very rare. I can get 140m with the Parani SD1000 and the stubby antenna but I'm waiting for the 8" antenna to increase the range.?ÿ
How far have you shot robotically from the prism without assistance? I'm guessing for me it's 350 meters.?ÿ
How far have you shot robotically from the prism without assistance? I'm guessing for me it's 350 meters.?ÿ
A little over 2,000', but I had a directional antenna on the tripod.?ÿ Even then comms were slow, presumably because a lot of packets were failing the checksum.
Back in 2008 or so I was testing a customer's Trimble S6 and got out to 2400 feet (730 meters) or so and it was still measuring to a single prism and responding to commands from the Trimble TSC2.
Helping the situation was the instrument was located about 10 feet off the ground.
The old (2007) data sheet for the Trimble S6 shows a robotic range of 500-700 meters, so mayhaps that was why I tried it at that distance?
GB
So 609 meters, I'd never come close to that kind of distance around here. That's with the Parani and what size antenna?
Nice. So you went beyond the max range. Currently with the stubby antenna my Parani sometimes has issues at less than 60m if there is a house barely off my line or a lot of obstacles between me and the robot. Comms slow down and/or it will disconnect or fail to shoot. With good line of sight though it will go 140m max, but the instrument will search and find the target at that distance with my mini 360 prism and leica's spec sheet says ATR works to 100m with the mini prism. So I'm at least getting longer than spec oh that.?ÿ
I'm waiting for an adapter to use the full size Leica 360 prism with my pole. For now I have the Sokkia 360 ATP1 prism.?ÿ
Or was that the geomax with the radio handle? I think the Geomax is basically the same as the tps1200+ Leica I'm using. I just can't justify asking the boss for a $1600 radio handle when the Parani works.
That's with the Parani and what size antenna?
I had a 7" antenna on the data collector, but a directional (not a whip) antenna on the instrument tripod.?ÿ The gun was a Leica TCRA1102plus.?ÿ The shot was over flat open ground.
I had been using a Topcon robot with Carlson software and having a ton on radio range issues.?ÿ I was taking a Trimble S6 and Trimble Yuma2 for a test drive and I wanted to see what the limits were.?ÿ I went out to a long straight stretch of road with lots of fast food joints and car dealerships to provide a nasty RF environment.?ÿ The S6 is specs say it can recognize and track a multitrack prism (MT-1000) out to 800m (2650 ft). I set the instrument in the median and drove out to about 2500 ft.?ÿ The radio was solid so I started walking to see how much further I could go.?ÿ It was an overcast day and I was out close to 3000 ft before it started having issues tracking the MT-1000.?ÿ Then I went back to the truck and started driving with the DC inside the truck to check the max range of the radio.?ÿ I was around 4000 ft before the radio started dropping out.
Long shots are OK for near-enough work, but remember that any misalignment of the tracking/pointing which is insignificant at 100 metres may well become a gross error by the time you get out to 500 metres plus.
The only time I'm ever really pushing the distance is while doing a backsight.
I'm working on a job site that has a 544m & a 500m leg in the primary control network.?ÿ I'm not sure those legs were used in the original control scheme (provided control) but I incorporated them into mine for verification.?ÿ The MS50 had no problem with the shot although I'm not sure if the standard CS20 radio would reach out that far.?ÿ
I think the longest I've done was actually just in the 700-800 foot range.?ÿ It was a Topcon robot and the radio was cutting out right around there anyway.
