Back to the original post, I just rented an Explorer for a couple of days surveying the live long day on the railroad in Fresno. It worked well, but then so does the Escape for the small amount of equipment I flew down. But the killer was that Ford, at least in the Explorer, has gone the way of the Asian manufactures and the power ports shut down when the ignition is off. I can't recharge batteries while I work. I hate that in a car.
DWoolley, post: 370697, member: 6749 wrote: It strikes me as odd to see only one tripod in a land surveying vehicle. In fact, several of the setups only have room for one tripod.
The immediate questions are:
1.) How are the surveyors efficiently adding redundancy to their networks? Do they walk back to the back sight and the check point to "check in" several times during a long set-up or minimally, before they pick up?
2.) When performing boundary surveys do how do they record observations, particularly if turning directions, to back sights, foresight (s)?
3.) Plumb poles/rods are known for getting out of adjustment, certainly less stable than a tribrach, how do these surveyors maintain a high level of accuracy? Or possibly, high accuracy isn't as important in a world of RTK/RTN and low distortion projections? There is logic to questioning why a surveyor worry about conventional instrument accuracy when the RTK is mixed in at 0.09' at 95% (horizontal).
In our survey vehicles we have five Trimax tripods each. One for the instrument and four complete sights - each checked regularly. This is how it has been for my entire career. Maybe I am old fashioned?
DWoolley
We have 5 trimax tripods and 1 dutch hill. We have 5 tribrachs. When traversing miles down a logging road I just traverse over the top of the 5 tripods I have set up. Dan runs the targets on the ATV and I move down the road in the truck. I get the centerline topo shots by myself with the robot. He drops by occasionally and gives me a pile of target heights. I usually put up my own backsight but occasionally he is there so he does it.
3 Stabila aluminum tripods, 1 Sokkia aluminum tripod & 4 Lietz tribrachs and 1 Sitepro fiberglass tripod for the TS and a Plano box full of prisms & targets and one triple prism assembly and a couple of mini prisms.
With an ATV I can run a TS traverse by myself.
When I am running thru the woods with two people, I will set a 1x1x48 lath or a 60d nail in something nearby for BS and my helper will go be ahead with a tripod FS setup.
Can't post picture, mine are too large apparently. Just got a 2016 3/4 chevy LT crew 8ft box titanium roll up cover hiding my stuff. Bluetooth phone, backup camera etc...not a top of line truck but a nice perk for being a corporate monkey. As far as the suv guys, once you try a pickup you'll be hooked. I've always had surburbans, and 1 explorer. While easy to use, especially compared to a tall pickup when you're short like me....... the noise on a dirt road and the fear of rolling one made me go for a pickup 4 years ago.
Finally got around to some carpentry work...which I suck at. I will be removing the second row of seats and making a cage to keep stuff off me in the event it decides to relocate. Luckily I am a better welder than carpenter.
Darryl Beard, post: 371238, member: 11556 wrote:
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Finally got around to some carpentry work...which I suck at. I will be removing the second row of seats and making a cage to keep stuff off me in the event it decides to relocate. Luckily I am a better welder than carpenter.
good idea to go with a cage...i've been thinking about rigging up my poles at a diagonal where they aren't staged to become Vlads.
how are you liking the Escape? are you hearing wind coming from the dash like there's a leak up there? it's that way in every escape i've been in.
kjypls, post: 369600, member: 9749 wrote: I work out of my VW TDI wagon on the weekends. It holds everything just fine, and gets well over 40mpg. Hand calculated tanks this time of year are 46-47mpg, and low to mid 40's in colder weather.
Why don't US manufactures move to diesel? Thats been a question I've asked myself for decades, as others have as well.
As it turns out, emissions standards clean enough for the EPA are nearly unobtainable for a mid $20k passenger car. We know this because of VWs emissions scandal right now. With the way things are going PR wise and after VWs day in court last week, it looks like VW is going to pay serious $$ to take my car back.
BTW, if you have one of the scandal vehicles and haven't registered for your "customer care package" of $1000, you have until Saturday to do so.
heard anything yet on a fix? I'm waiting until I hear something and can make an informed decision. hate to give it up as it has been the best car I have owned and the 41 to 48 mpg
is a nice change, used the $1,000 to buy snow tires for the family
rplsntx, post: 407473, member: 8904 wrote: how are you liking the Escape? are you hearing wind coming from the dash like there's a leak up there? it's that way in every escape i've been in.
Only had it 3 days and traded for the GMC pickup. Bridgee likes the grocery-getter and I'm good with the 1/2 ton.
Rankin_File, post: 370720, member: 101 wrote: IT'S HERE, IT'S CUTE BUT DINKY. NO TOP RACK, NO STEP BUMPER, NO RECIEVER HITCH , CLOTH INTERIOR, CARPET. TOLD MY BOSS I COULD TAKE IT BUT IT WOULD BE TRASH IN 6 MONTHS....
CURRENTLY IN NEGOTIATIONS VIA MY BOSS, WITH THE BRIDGE INSPECTOR FOR HIS RIG- 2015 GMC 1500.... HOPEFULLY, NEED AND APPEAL TO THE PRE-FRONTAL CORTEX WILL WORK OUT, BUT I'VE BEEN HERE LONG ENOUGH TO NOT HOLD MY BREATH...
Mark Silver, post: 369097, member: 1087 wrote: Tom: My F250 (just the stock 460) gets 8 MPG. It has 210,000 miles on it. I am not really in good enough health to want to brave the total but here goes...
(220,000 miles / 8 MPG) * $4.00 ($/Gal Average) = $105,000
I hear you brother...
I really wanna know how you nurse 8 mpg out of a Ford 460. The last one I owned got more like 5 or 6. It got so bad mileage the gas gauge would drop a quarter of a tank overnight with it just sitting...;)
paden cash, post: 407561, member: 20 wrote: I really wanna know how you nurse 8 mpg out of a Ford 460. The last one I owned got more like 5 or 6. It got so bad mileage the gas gauge would drop a quarter of a tank overnight with it just sitting...;)
Sounds very much like my '77 Chev pickup with a 454- I get about 7 around town with premium, 6 on regular. The best mileage I ever got was 10.75 MPG driving on southbound I-5 between Seattle and the U.S. 12 exit south of Chehalis; but then again, that's all downhill, too 🙂
The only superior evidence is that which you haven't yet found.
SellmanA, post: 407564, member: 8564 wrote: Sounds very much like my '77 Chev pickup with a 454- I get about 7 around town with premium, 6 on regular. The best mileage I ever got was 10.75 MPG driving on southbound I-5 between Seattle and the U.S. 12 exit south of Chehalis; but then again, that's all downhill, too 🙂
I had a Chevy C10 ('71?) long bed for a number of years that came with a "396" fat block. Its name was "Ol' Whitey". It also came with the biggest two barrel Rochester carb that man had ever seen. As far as pickups go it was a good one and it really didn't get that bad gas mileage. I drove it to Fluvanna TX with an empty bed and got around 14 or 15 miles to the gallon. I drove back to OK with the bed stuffed full of three tons of furniture and got the exact same mileage. That was a head scratcher.
It met its demise one cold winter night when the temps dropped near zero. There hadn't been any anti-freeze in it for years. A fitting death for the old warrior.
I would go deaf real fast. Cranking up the tunes to drown out all the rattling.
first few years i surveyed it was out of a '72 chevy van with a 307, three on the tree, no a/c or power steering, and cragar mags. don't remember what the mileage was like- i do remember that i looked pretty ripped after driving that thing houselot to houselot for a few years. and it got really warm inside, which sucked about 8 months out of the year. and being a three on the tree... wasn't much worry about anybody stealing it as me and the boss were the only two people on earth who could even find a gear in it. and until i convinced him to slap some magnetic signs on the side we used to have to explain our presence in random neighborhoods to the local police about 4 jobs out of 5.
flyin solo, post: 407584, member: 8089 wrote: first few years i surveyed it was out of a '72 chevy van with a 307, three on the tree, no a/c or power steering, and cragar mags. don't remember what the mileage was like- i do remember that i looked pretty ripped after driving that thing houselot to houselot for a few years. and it got really warm inside, which sucked about 8 months out of the year. and being a three on the tree... wasn't much worry about anybody stealing it as me and the boss were the only two people on earth who could even find a gear in it. and until i convinced him to slap some magnetic signs on the side we used to have to explain our presence in random neighborhoods to the local police about 4 jobs out of 5.
I drove one of those for a while. The 'tree' linkage would get caught "in between" gears and the only way to continue was to get out and pry the linkage levers on the side of the transmission back to their proper position. I got good at it.
Ours had a sliding door on the side....which would at times slide all the way off! Not to worry, just pick it up and gingerly set it back in the door tracks..easy-peezy!
flyin solo, post: 407584, member: 8089 wrote: first few years i surveyed it was out of a '72 chevy van with a 307, three on the tree, no a/c or power steering, and cragar mags. don't remember what the mileage was like- i do remember that i looked pretty ripped after driving that thing houselot to houselot for a few years. and it got really warm inside, which sucked about 8 months out of the year. and being a three on the tree... wasn't much worry about anybody stealing it as me and the boss were the only two people on earth who could even find a gear in it. and until i convinced him to slap some magnetic signs on the side we used to have to explain our presence in random neighborhoods to the local police about 4 jobs out of 5.
I owned a 1969 Chevrolet 3/4 ton pickup with 3 on the tree (what knucklehead didn't get the 4 speed floor shift with granny gear, I don't know). The shift handle was sort of loose from the shift linkage so you had to find the linkage and pull at the right time to move it right or left. It had kind of an invisible groove that you felt for. Apparently this was a common defect in GM products?
I recall having to get under the hood of our '58 Chevy (that we had when I got my license) and work the linkages occasionally when it got stuck between gears.
Dave Karoly, post: 407621, member: 94 wrote: I owned a 1969 Chevrolet 3/4 ton pickup with 3 on the tree (what knucklehead didn't get the 4 speed floor shift with granny gear, I don't know). The shift handle was sort of loose from the shift linkage so you had to find the linkage and pull at the right time to move it right or left. It had kind of an invisible groove that you felt for. Apparently this was a common defect in GM products?
Common in column shifting- had an F100 that wasn't much better.
If safety is such a concern with everyone, why in the hell would smart people load an open seating vehicle (no head ache rack/divider) up with 2-15 pound projectiles (some sharp and pointed) up in a vehicle and proceed to ride around with the launching device cocked for 10-125+ miles a day???? Then talk about the great gas mileage. I'll take my 1/2 to 3/4 ton covered pickup over an ill prepared suv any day! My 2 cents, Jp
Jp7191, post: 407628, member: 1617 wrote: If safety is such a concern with everyone, why in the hell would smart people load an open seating vehicle (no head ache rack/divider) up with 2-15 pound projectiles (some sharp and pointed) up in a vehicle and proceed to ride around with the launching device cocked for 10-125+ miles a day???? Then talk about the great gas mileage. I'll take my 1/2 to 3/4 ton covered pickup over an ill prepared suv any day! My 2 cents, Jp
Friend of mine told me his party chief's wife had explicit instructions to sue the company if he was killed in a wreck in their overloaded suburban, this was in the 1980s.