Sounds like a good idea, BUT as it stands you have no PIN. How do you get a pin?
I think it has been explained, call a surveyor. All surveyors have a card buried in there wallet, that's the secret. My card states PLS in good standing. Just pulling your BEER LEG.:-D
brian
First let me say I do appreciate your whole post,but i do need to point out the following.
your quote:
as this thread is evidence. Instead of investing a modest of amount of money to hire a professional to find property corners properly, YOU SEEM to be wanting to go the cheaper "do it yourself" route
My comment:
you seem to not have read or better yet,remembered the prior two posts.
here they are:
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pat patterson
Depending on what you're trying to do, you will probably need to hire a surveyor at some point, so why not just do it properly from the beginning?
ME
Just CURIOUS where it is. If i were to do something that required or may require in the future a certified doc of it,,then a state licensed survey would be cheap insurance
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Arbitrarily calling a section line north or east as a basis of bearings seems to be a Midwest practice, I never heard of it until a few weeks ago.
I do a lot of work in Mendocino County on the North Coast. The 1960s era surveys I am following have an astronomic basis of bearings which is really handy because with one end of the line I can find the other end. This is in deep forest, steep and brushy. Sometimes I get a handheld GPS position on one end and calculate a search lat long on the other end but that may get me within 100' then I have to scramble around looking for the 1960s bearing trees (sometimes stumps).
Thanks for the added facts. Really informative/interesting
yes it sure does. thanks
> Just CURIOUS where it is. If i were to do something that required or may require in the future a certified doc of it,,then a state licensed survey would be cheap insurance
I'm quite aware of what you said, however, as others have pointed out, the "monument" you may find, may or MAY NOT be your property corner. In fact, in many jurisdictions, there is a possibility that even if you find the "correct" monument, it may not be the property corner, there are boundary location laws that may come into play, and only a knowledgeable professional can gather the relevant evidence and issue an informed professional opinion of where your property boundary legally is. Finding property boundaries is not something that a do-it-yourselfer, in most situations should be doing; especially considering the financial ramifications of an improperly located boundary.
To locate the stakes electronically, Maybe a microchip, attached to the monument. Now, the monument talks to you and tells you it is the corner to ____ deed, corner number___. Can you imagine the mess, if somebody pulled and moved that monument, and XYZ realtor, found it with his/her Ipod, and app, and now, they flag it all up, and build a 2 million dollar house?
Or, maybe the dingbat waterline installer, yanks it with a trencher, and somebody sticks it in the ground..... in the wrong place by 10'......
So, we do have a electronic method to locate corners. You buy a nice GPS system, and computers, and learn to use them, and bingo, RTK found it!
So, "I won't back down", by Tom Petty I don't think, there is a better way yet.
So, if you pay for a real survey, well, put you some steel fence posts by all the monuments, and preserve your investment.
Nate
> To locate the stakes electronically, Maybe a microchip, attached to the monument. Now, the monument talks to you and tells you it is the corner to ____ deed, corner number___.
The technology already exists, and is being used in utility marking. Check out the Berntsen video demonstrating a typical application.
As Nate pointed out, there's no guarantee that a device like this won't be moved from its initially-installed location, but that doesn't mean it has no place in the survey world. I don't know anyone using these for parcel corner marks, but it's early days yet.
I should note that I'm a little mystified by the many remarks discouraging the original poster from looking for parcel corners on his own. As long as he understands the risk involved, and limits his application to his own use (i.e. not offering land surveying services to others), I see no harm in pointing out ways to make the job easier. Attempts at creating a "hands off!" aura around anything related to do-it-yourself boundary surveying comes off as small-minded protectionism.
Good one Charley. My secret weapon is not giving away my secret weapon: My knowledge and experience.
I have to agree. I actually enjoy when this happens as they rarely find the corners and are even more enamored with your skills after you find in a few minutes what they spent hours trying to find.
Another [msg=209576]current thread[/msg] illustrates the danger of just finding a pin and not assessing the whole situation. Somebody appears to have built a fence to a found pin that was the wrong one, but close to the right one.
> The "something" that only the licensed land surveyor posseses
While I would agree with many of the points that you have made, do not forget that there are people out there who have excellent spatial skills, experience with instruments used for measuring angles and distances, and who possess the necessary skill set to locate and identify corner markers with a reasonable level of skill, but who are not necessarily licensed as professional land surveyors. What they can legally do with that skill set is a matter of law.
Nate,
I like the way you wrote that. Yes, there is a difference between reconnaissance and instrument grade boundary retracements. Thanks.
Al
you're right, after i posted i did consider i should edit my post. It was a bit harsh. probably an overreaction to a few recent cases.
Just the other day, i had a case with the nieghbor of an adjoiner at the back of a lot being very agressive. It turned out that she was afraid the owner of the back lot would discover that she had built a shed over her line. She had used the wrong marker. She had found my clients rear corner and assumed that to be the mark between her and the common nieghbor.
Then ran into another clown of architect/builder who convinced his elderly sister that she didnt need no surveyor, took her 80+ year old plat, added two distances on an angled line, and proceeded to begin from the edge of where he decided that there really should have been a utilty right of way, turned a right angle to put her fence 6 ft over into the side and back lots.
what i do tell ppeople is that unless you have a very good idea of where the corner was and had seen it before and are sure you know what it looked like, you need a surveyor. Around here, for very large lots, google earth is often good enough to give a fairly accurate picture of the old occupation lines, and when used in conjunction a plat, can get an intelligent land owner close to his boundary.
Thanks Al.
I think it really gets into the territory of a land surveyor, when the subdivision has large deficiencies, or excesses. Then, what to do, really requires somebody that knows what they are doing.
N
Jim,
its good to see your accurate grasp of some of the feedback I received:
Im shocked how many people on other forums,not just the 3 or 4 on this one,just dont read the post,even when its pointed out,they still insist on missing it!
They still may not even know who are.
I do appreciate the rest of you.
Your quote
" I'm a little mystified by the many remarks discouraging the original poster from looking for parcel corners on his own. As long as he understands the risk involved, and limits his application to his own use (i.e. not offering land surveying services to others), I see no harm in pointing out ways to make the job easier. Attempts at creating a "hands off!" aura around anything related to do-it-yourself boundary surveying comes off as small-minded protectionism."
> Im trying to locate survey markers on a piece of vacant property in southern california rural land.
First the caveat: Finding your corner markers is a good thing to do as a prudent landowner, but doing so yourself without having had a surveyor point them out to you can bring trouble.
It can be easy to msidentify monuments, thinking that they mark a corner of your parcel when they might actually mark the corner of a nearby parcel that is not a common corner to your parcel, or maybe something someone set for a horseshoe pit or to tie their dog to (the proverbial "goat stake" in survey parlance).
Prior to taking any action in reliance upon whatever you might find, including telling someone else that what you have found is a property corner. Certainly have a surveyor verify anything you find and reset anything missing prior to making any improvements that require knowledge of the boundary location 9and most do unless you are building something relatively small in the middle of a large parcel).
With those cautions in mind, here's some info you may find helpful to find monuments at or near your corners (again, hire a local surveyor to make that definitive determination).
> The lots have likely been surveyed and marked,between the 60's and 90's.
>
Typically, surveyors set iron/steel rod, pipe, or rebar for monuments. If surveys occurred in the 1960s and later, that's what you'd be looking for. Prior to 1960 back to the 1890s or so, you may have a mixture of metal monuments, marked rocks, and wood stakes. The farther back you go, the more prevalent the use of rocks and wood will be, and the harder to find.
In rural areas, unless there is a need to protect them from being inadvertently bumped out of position or pulled by disagreeing neighbors, monuments will usually be set so that the top 1" to 3" is above ground, making them a little easier to find. If they are set below ground for some reason, they will be anywhaere from just barely below to as deep as needed to avoid a foreseen hazard. For example, if a corner falls in a farm field, the monument might be set 3' or so down to avoid getting tilled up.
>
> Q-1 ive used a metal detector(typical relic detector) without luck.
> Are there any technical devices that can locate the steel -rod corner markers ?
Any metal detector should pick up a metal survey monument as all typically will detect ferrous materials. Many commercial hobby type locators might not have the range to produce a signal from a few feet away or if the monument is buried more than a few inches deep. Surveyors' metal locators are tuned to locate only ferrous materials and most can produce at least a faint signal to a monument from several feet away or when buried up to 3' (+/- depending upon soil density and makeup).
You can probably rent one at a survey supply shop. If you are in So. CA, there are a few around. Check the Yellow Pages or internet under "survey equipment".
> Q-2 How do surveyors locate them when buried?...other than by written landmark.
Surveyors use the maps and/or field notes from previous surveys, and physical clues on the land when they exist (which isn't in every case). These things will get us close enough to then use a metal detector and a shovel.
If you have not already done so, go to the County Recorder's office to get copies of the survey maps of you parcel and surveys of nearby parcels. In some counties, the place to start is the Assessor's office as the Assessors maps often incllude references to filed survey maps. Those references, and a view of how all the parcels generally fit together is the only useful purpose of the Assessor's maps. Do not use one to try to locate your corner monuments. 1st, they do not have complete information for that purpose, and 2nd, they may contain mistakes that could lead you to the wrong locations. Their purpose is as an index to taxed properties, not as a depiction of accurate boundaries.
If you do not know how to read a map, if you do not understand bearings well enough to navigate with a compass, if you do not know how to set the magnetic declination for your compass or what the magnitude of the declination is in your area, stop. Admit that at best you are setting yourself up for an exercise in frustration and at worst you could do some real harm by finding wrong points, causing things to be built in wrong locations, and requiring expensive legal action to sort out the matters that could have been averted with a proper survey, and just hire a licensed surveyor.
If you are comfortable reading maps, familiar with the use of bearings and your response to reading the last paragraph was "Of course I know what magnetic declination is, and know that it's XX degrees YY minutes (don't forget direction) at my property, then continue on, with caution.
Surveyors will use a variety of tools. First we need a starting point. This will be an easily located or previously found survey monument, but may be a road centerline or a fence corner. Sometimes a rough direction based upon the locations of nearby landmarks, or even the location of the sun are sufficient for rough direction to get to a search location. Sometimes the use of pacing is plenty close enough to determine rough distances to get to search areas. With the advancement of electronics, GPS and other gizmos make it ever easier to make quick, precise measurements for searching corners, so pacing is a fading skill. Some pace well enough that they can step off 300' over fairly level terrain and know they are within 3' of their intended distance. That's plenty close enough to begin a search.
If you have worked in a job that regularly uses pacing, then you may have the skill to get you close. If not, rather than taking the time to figure out the length of your pace, just go to Home Depot and buy a 100' fiberglas measuring tape and get your wife/husband/kid/brother/buddy who will do most anything for beer and have them hold the zero end as you work your way around.
Once you've traveled a mapped course from a point you've found to the next one you are trying to find, break out the metal detector and the shovel. Be sure to keep the shovel far enough away from the metal detector to avoid interference.
DO NOT start moving rocks around as you search. That rock you toss aside might actually be the original survey monument at that location. Usually rock monuments will range in size from that of a small loaf of brad up to the size of a mid-sized cooler. They were usually marked in some way, but the marks are very difficult to discern after having been there for 100 to 160 years. Seeing them usually takes someone with a lot of experience picking them out among the weather marks.
> Q-3 Since land mark notations in the surveyors records may be missing,I would think at some point they have embedded some kind of device to alert an electronic handheld receiver, when they are within a certain distance of a marker.
>
If so, that would be news to most of us. The closest thing I know of to what you imagine is that many surveyors, when using non-ferrous monuments, may place a magnet about the size of 6 or 8 stacked nickles inside of a plastic case the size of a prescription pill bottle in a hole below or alongside the monument set. If you dig up something like that, you can be assured that you probably just dug up your corner monument. If you do, stop what you're doing, put the little pill bottle back and call a surveyor.
The purpose of the magnet is to give the metal locator something that it can find. they are also sometimes set along with metal monuments to enhace the range from which a metal locator can get a reading.
> Q-4 i suppose that would be something that only surveyors have and or the cost of one is so high that its cheaper to have it surveyed by a licensed surveyor?
Nah. The little magnets cost about the same as a fancy coffee drink. The metal locators cost, as someone else in this thread pointed out, as little as about $520, on up to about $950 to buy. You can probably rent one for something between $20 and $40 a day. A Home depot Tape and REI compass will run you $100 +/- combined.
But if you are talking about the real equipment that we use to identify and to determine the precise locations of boundary corners, yeah, that gets a bit pricey. the equipment, depending upon configuration, brand, used or new, will run anywhere fromm about $40,000 up to well over $100,000. The really important part of our toolbox though is the several years of experience (in a position of responsibility) and education just to be allowed to sit for the licensing exams. Most of the licensed surveyors you would deal with will have more than 15 years experience and many will have a college degree in addition to their experience.
I hope this info helps. And just in case I was not clear enough, if you do not already have the skills of knowing how to properly navigate with a compass, how to read a map, etc., stop and hire a licensed surveyor. If you do move forward to attempt to locate these monuments yourself, do not take any actions that require certain knowledge of the boundary, and do not assert to anyone that what you have found is the boundary until you have had a licensed surveyor verify what you have found. If you do this on your own, heed the cautions of the other surveyors on this thread and accept the fact that you can cause very expensive problems by relying on whatever you happen to find.
Thanks for your thorough explanation.
Just a note
The only time I can think of that I am really confident in doing a rare but occasional prop line/stake approximations is when the parcels only require simple equalateral trianglar computations .to determine 3 or 4 sided parcels.
I only guestimate the simple stuff.:'(
Have you heard about the tennis ball method?
No expensive equipment required.
Is this an xrated survey method?