Many years ago I was a green rodman on a survey crew for the US Forest Service. I was told a story by one of the crew that goes something like this :
"Tom, what's taking so long? Give us a shot for line OK?"
"Ok Ok, hold your horses. My bob string broke and I'm fixin it"
tic tock tic tock
"Ok, all fixed. Take line"
So for the rest of the day Tom gave line with a repaired plumb bob, like this one.
Maybe a bit better than dropping a pebble??
sometimes you gotta recalibrate those plumb bobs
Would that induce 0.03' error, or 0.04'? It makes a difference, you know.
I don't know Paul, that is not too strange, seems adaptive.... Guy did what he could to keep things going.'
Strange is like the I-man I got in about 1978 to work with me the 18 yo Party Chief. The guy had strange clothes, like they were all worn out and golosashes like my grandpa put over his boots. Was lethargic when running line, and always complaining about the bad wine he had last night. When we would stop for a quick bite of lunch (working out in the woods of course), he would always pull out some half-eaten sandwich or burger or something. So, I never connected what might be going on. He was routinely late to the office for startup in the AM, which pi$$ed me off to no end. So he says, pick me up at McDonlds with the survey rig in the morning for the next day.
So, next day I get all of the goo for the days work including the paperwork, load the truck and swing into the McDonalds. No Oscar outside. Go inside, and no Oscar. Getting more pi$$ed now... So I am about to leave, and look over at the dumpster on my strut to the truck. The lid opens up, and out pops Oscars head.... He says, hey Mike, wait a minute let me grab lunch..... Dumpster dives a bit and comes up with a 1/3 of a Big Mac and a few fries... Asks me if I need a fillet of fish or something, he would look as he thought he had seen one...... F....me I could not frigging believe it. Guy was sleeping in the Micky D's dumpster, and getting his food there.... and running the gun during the day. That is a bit strange..... He didn't last to much longer, I ran his tail in the ground.
Were you running the line of a senior title?
I wonder if you were running a line of a senior title. If your guy had heard that such boundaries should not be straight, maybe he improvised a way to help you add some kinks in the line. :>
Strange Surveyor
You could always use this gyro stabilized bob.
We had one back in the 80's that said some doosey's. Boss told him to give me a back site on the pin (this is not a joke) his comment was "on which pin? the one we found or the one we didn't find"....there was silence after that.
He is also the guy while sitting in the middle of the back seat of the van while driving towards the sun (sun in his eyes) he exclaimed "man that suns a b1tch....you know that's where that saying came from dontcha?". Again, silence and then shaking of the heads.....
Strange Surveyor
Gordon, is that gyro the wheel of a "Wheelo"?
Mike Evans
NC PLS
I had a rodman once that stuck the plumb bob into the pipe and then held the string. It was about the fifth or sixth corner we shot that I noticed the string had a lean to it and I figured out what he was doing. That day required a restart.
I was head chainman cutting line through Pond Creek Bottoms (Sevier County, Arkansas) one thunder-stormy day. I had found a log across the slough about 200 foot upstream of line and had hacked my way back to the 'true' line...the tail chainman yelled "Here Come the Yain"...I looked up (to the cloudy sky) just in time to catch between my eyes the weighted end of the chain...that dang hair-lipped tail chainman done flung the 'smart' end across.
DDSM