I have a Trimble 5601 TS which is still in service.?ÿ What can I say??ÿ It works well and still provides great results!?ÿ It's days are numbered, but it would be a great back up.
The internal batteries need to be replaced and I was told the battery replacements with cleaning and calibration service is about $1000.?ÿ I know the service is a professional service, and I don't want to cheap out on it (I don't want my prof. service to be treated that way).
Is this the going price??ÿ?ÿ
That sounds like a reasonable price to me, but I'm not the guy paying the bills. I've seen/heard some of the bills we've had which makes me think $1000 is reasonable.?ÿ
Sort of on the topic...as someone that's running a 12 year old Leica 1203+, am I less likely to have an issue with the internal battery dying and losing my firmware if I always keep a battery in the total station? I have 4 batteries and it uses less than 2 a day, so I just pull the battery out to charge and immediately put the fresh one in and never leave it without a battery in it. I was hoping this would prevent said problem, but I don't know if that's true.?ÿ
Prior to EOL (end of life), calibration and battery replacement was in the $700-$800 range depending on the condition. ?ÿNow, no one in my area will perform the battery replacement or calibration. ?ÿIt??s unfortunate, the 5600 can hang with the S series for basic robotic functions. ?ÿIn fact, I feel it performs better in wooded environments. ?ÿReplace the battery cells with lithium to lighten the weight and increase performance and tweak the radio to Bluetooth to the data collector and you should be good for another decade or more.
My bigger concern is the tech told me they would soon not offer this service.?ÿ Also, mgmt. informed him (me) to expect significant cost increases.
Ok, I get it, this is planned obsolescence.?ÿ I understand this is the computer age.?ÿ But why brick an instrument that can still hang with the new stuff?
Does anyone know who will service these?
@wagner152?ÿ
I feel the same about my old Leica. With an RH17 radio handle and a modern 7" windows 10 tablet it's great. It maybe could be better in the woods but on construction sites with traffic, people and other obstacles constantly blocking line of sight I can't imagine another robot doing a better job of predicting and regaining lock. It seems like I'm rarely having to search to regain lock. With the newer Sokkia iX I would lose lock out in the open a lot of times. The newer tech does excite me some and I'm not the one paying for the equipment...but sometimes there isn't much reason to mess with a good thing.?ÿ
If you replace the batteries now should it not last at least another 7+ years, maybe 10+? My Leica is 12 and I haven't heard of this model failing, just the even older 1100s. We sold one recently that still worked fine, but it wasn't set up robotically. How old is your 5601??ÿ
The internal batteries are programmed to be outside of service life every 3 years - gun sends an alert message to the DC.?ÿ I replace batteries when the DC tells me to.?ÿ If I just cancel the alert message, it will continue to work, but I don't know for how long.?ÿ Does anyone else know?
Okay. I'd never heard of that before. Is that just specific to the Trimble 5600 series? We have had quite a few Leica total stations well over 15 years old that never seemed to need batteries, a 10 year old Sokkia SRX and another one traded at about 7 years old and the 12 year old Leica 1203+ I use. I've never seen any of them need a battery.?ÿ
@scott-bordenet We can do it at US Survey Supply. There are wear parts that can no longer be replaced but if everything is in good shape still, it can be updated / calibrated and the BU batteries replaced. End cost is just under $1,000 with shipping included. 866-US SURVEY.
Bump. ?ÿHoping someone will come along with help for you.
Meanwhile, I thought I had a meaningful comment for @350 regarding my 1998-Leica 1100 robot. ?ÿBut, as I started typing I realize I do not. ?ÿI often leave the battery in or out it seems. ?ÿ
She does sit for weeks and months at a time waiting to be put to work. ?ÿSo far, so good.
At the moment i am starting to measure voltage left in batteries in CU and Station when changing them with new batteries, to find out how long they did work.
Seems like at least 6-7 years is possible maybe even 10years but no guarantee. Statistic is just new. If i remember right somebody wrote here 2,7Volt at Control Unit CU was still working. Maybe measure voltage left in internal backup batteries in station and CU. If it is below 2,8Volt change. Or do Firmwarebackup with toolkit below, wait till it dies and then change batteries (and tell me what voltage was left when stop working ???? ).
With some soldering skills battery change is possible on you own. And also reset battery change date is possible.
Maybe read here for some more information:
Where are you located? $1000 sounds high. You could just do battery replacement. No need to spend money on things you don??t need on a 20 year old instrument!
I appreciate the comment either way. Good to know yours hasn't failed yet despite leaving the battery out on a regular basis.?ÿ
Mine (my bosses really) only sits unused Saturday and Sunday. And sometimes not even on Saturday. So far it's holding up good to the constant use the past 6-7 months since the Sokkia got shelved. I trust this thing a whole lot more than I did the 2 year old Sokkia iX-503. No comparison in quality.?ÿ
Located in Indianapolis.?ÿ Yeah, I know it is a 20 y/o instrument...but nothing is going to provide significantly better results for its intended use.?ÿ Yes, I can get lighter and more features (pics, scanning, etc.), but nothing we need and not worth the expense to upgrade.
Going to do the full batteries, cleaning, and calibration for $1000 ($700 for batteries only).?ÿ Then see how long it lasts...
As I understand, some (all ?) of the 5600 series , have this technique of saving critical data (firmware AND cal !) on volatile , battery-backed memory. A very 90's concept. I would highly recommend not losing a single moment and doing a full backup with the tools Robots generously shared in that other thread...
firmware is not unit-specific and can always be copied over from a different unit, but calibration is extremely impractical to recover.
disclaimer : I don't own a 5600. The trimble 4000 GPS are a bit similar in saving the firmware in battery-backed RAM too.
