California Surveyors Forums

Yes, I've searched the threads for this . . .

I currently have standard orders for the survey crews to clean, peg and maintain equipment once a month.

I have been assuming this is being done as it shows up on the work sheet.

Whilst the crews have been faithfully cleaning equipt, and ordering new cables batteries etc, they have had no idea about pegging the levels, and double centering the instruments. When confronted, they state that all of the other companies just send equipment out for service and adjustment.

Am I living in the stone age ? or has simple pegging of a level gone the way of the plumbob and chaining pin.

What do other companies do?

What's a chaining pin?

Just kidding, I know it's them things that look like skinny red-n-white lawn darts that surveyors used to play mumbly peg with. ;-)

I haven't used my level in quite some time, and the last time I did get it out was to show my crew how to peg it. Unfortunately, it was in near perfect adjustment, so they didn't learn a thing.

As far as the collimation adjustments (double centering) on the TS, mine has automatic routines for that. I showed the crew how to get to those routines a couple of times and admonished them to do this regularly. How often it gets done is another matter.

At times when I'm in the field with them, I ask about it and sometimes I'm told that they just did so within the last couple of days. Other times I just get the deer in the headlights look.

If your using a TS that doesn't have auto adjustment routines, you are in the stone age. But whether your using equipment with auto adjustment routines or not, the crew needs to know either how to run those routines or do the adjustments themselves as apporpriate. Mostly this is easy stuff and takes about 15 minutes.

The gun being out of adjustment is a poor reason to have to redo work because the crew gathered what amounts to junk, or lose a day or two of field time while the gun goes to the shop.

Most of the time we use GPS but I recommend using the level for critical staking operations. I suppose the total station would work very well too.

Our TS is relatively new, however, it was dropped a couple of years ago and now the gyro doesnt work. It will be very expensive to repair and the shops just want us to buy a new instrument.
Even without gyro, that instrument is very well aligned.

I'm worried that the crew didnt know how to peg a level.
Is this one of the waste bi-products of surveying education programs ? All book knowledge and no practical experience ?

I worry about those "guys" who pass their exams but don't know the difference between a live oak, a white oak or a valley oak, and can't peg a level.
Are we back to using lawn sprinklers as lot corners ?

I will teach my guys how to peg their levels.

Thanks ;~}

You must have hired some fresnoids. You should have hired your graduates from Oregon Institute of Technology. Last I checked, they are still graduating surveyors who have not only seen an instrument, but have actually learned how to properly use and adjust them.

A couple of them might even know that there was a time that plumb bobs were used for something other than tapping tacks into the tops of hubs.

I worry about those "guys" who pass their exams but don't know the difference between a live oak, a white oak or a valley oak, and can't peg a level.

Dammit, , I'm a surveyor not an arborist!

Many years ago, back in the days of CTDC at Caltrans, there were separate codes for English Walnut and Black Walnut. I asked a surveyor who happened to be a walnut farmer's kid what the difference was. The reply: About 50 cents a pound. Why?

This makes me feel so much better about not being able to find work in the surveying industry.[please note sarcasm] I think I'll clean and oil my chain tonight after class;).

We discussed pegging the level in Survey 300 at Sac. City college, and again in Survey 320, so at least it's still being taught.

E_Page wrote:You must have hired some fresnoids. You should have hired your graduates from Oregon Institute of Technology.

Hey Even, you should really learn how to spell, it's Fresno, heheheee. Looks like OIT doesn't teach spelling.

The curriculum at California State University, Fresno does teach (at least when I attended) how to peg a level, amongst other items, but when you go into the real world and you don't use it, you loose it, as I'm sure you are aware of.

Maybe that's part of the difference between a technical school and an accredited university?

v

v

Now back to out regular scheduled topic.

My crew has recently begun to calibrate our instrument on a monthly basis. I even took them over to the nearby baseline in Fremont to do a field check.
When was the last time you used a baseline?

Um, Keith. OIT was one of the first colleges accredited for surveying, and has been training surveyors since 1947.

One of the great things about a smaller college such as OIT, is that while they view advanced academic training as necessary, they put a higher importance on the instructors' actual experience relevant to surveying (real experience, not time lecturing text book materials to young skulls full of mush).

ALL of my survey instructors were PLSs. Heck, even a student or two were PLSs prior to graduating. Does Raisin U have any PLSs on staff anymore? They might, but I heard that the one they had retired recently or was going to retire soon.

Contrary to popular opinion, the CA PLS exam is not that tough, surely a PhD in geomatics should be able to pass without difficulty on the first try. (OK, maybe the 2nd, or 3rd, or ...)

Another thing about our little "technical school" is that the students were highly encouraged to obtain employment actually surveying during the months they were not full time students. The average OIT surveying student came to OIT with some experience and would graduate typically with 3 to 5 years of aggregate real-world surveying experience behind them. Even those having entered the program with no experience would graduate with more than 12 months of actual survey experience.

I've reviewed a lot of the resume booklets put together by fresnoids (fresnoid: (noun) one attending or having attended Raisin U.) in recent years. I have been astonished at the number of students who get through their senior year having less than 6 months experience in a position directly related to surveying.

Here's a couple of other definitions for you too:

fresnish: (adj) Displaying the attitude that now that the employer has been fortunate enough to hire a freshly minted Raisin U graduate, said graduate shall proceed to show the employer everything he has been doing incorrectly for 20+ years and correct company practices and procedures. (see also: "would be geomatic messiah")

fresnating: (verb) the act of irritating one's supervisor and coworkers by demonstrating a fresnish attitude.

Fortunately, most fresnoids are actually quite intelligent, and after running their supposedly educated noses painfully into the wall of reality a few times, they fresnate at a decreasing rate until, eventually, all such behavior fades away. Many are fortunate enough to work with graduates from OIT, New Mexico State, or even Santiago Canyon College, who are all generally a step ahead of the average fresnoid for the first couple of years of actual work.

For those who stick with it once they discover that there is more to surveying beyond the computer screen, they eventually become indistinguishable from others in the profession.



Sorry for the hijack, Good.








(for those who are now foaming at the mouth, I can't help you. But for the more reasonable, hopefully you can recognize humor mixed with a little reality. I have many friends and know many respected surveyors who are fresnoids. I'm sure that most of them fresnated during their first year or two of actual work. And now, I am off for a few days of working with a group of surveyors, several fresnoids among them, who will undoubtedly give me grief for this shot.)

Our closest baseline has been replaced by an expressway.


As far as arboristical tallent, it is used to identify bearing trees. I've seen section corners mis-placed when clearly wrong bearing trees were used.

An English walnut brings no money at all. Black walnut trunks are used as a graft for other varieties such as big heart leafs. The black walnut has a better root stock.

Schooling is great but Land surveying is also a learned trade.
Students who are allowed to sit for and pass their exams right out of school are dangerous. (not all of them of course) but a majority.

I've interviewed "grads" who literally tell me that since they have been studying the latest technology, "they" actually know more than I do about Land Surveying. [this is a true interview quote from a Fresno Grad]

"Alma Mater"

Students who pass their exams (PLS) right out of school must have the requisite experience.

In the case of an OIT student who I know of who had their license prior to graduation, he had nearly 14 years behind him already.


And I've got to disagree with you on a point. Perhaps it's semantics, but Land Surveying is not a trade. Perhaps construction staking is, but not boundary.

A trade suggests learned skills that can then be performed by rote. A profession requires judgment to abstract issues and the trade aspects are only supportive of the professional.

Ummmm interesting reply there Evan.

I did not know that OIT grads were so superior right out of college (rolls eyes) heheheee.
But then, OIT is in that bustling town called Klammath Falls. What else is there to do around there besides catch world class red band trout?

Evan, Sorry to offend, And I agree Land surveying is a profession, however, the optimum word I refer to is LEARNED pronounced Learn-edd.

I got Learn-edd when My Dad pulled me down a hill while chaining out some distances. I "said" I was braced and ready.

We get Learn-edd when we are shown to dig a hole at a metal fence post corner instead of wakling away because we can't "Schoenstadt" it.

We get Learn-edd when the old boys show us how to make field notes that will stand up in court and more importantly are USABLE to our office staff.

I think the confusion of Professionalism today, is that we have the ability to calc everything in a computor, stuff it into a magic yellow box and then spew it out into the real world and we call that Land Surveying.
Whether it is construction staking or Boundary retracement, it requires thought from what we learn-edd in our studies, and physical fortitude from what we learn-edd working with our mentors.

But not to offend . . . .sorry ;}
Oldie but "Good"ie ??

Relying on a beige box to give us numbers to load into a black box that tells us, supposedly, where those numbers represent a location on the ground is not professionalism.

Knowing why those numbers are what they are, why they go where they go, and recognizing when they're not in the right location is part of professionalism.

And taking all those other things you describe as having learn-edd, and using them in your judgement, that's professionalism.




Keith, I'm glad I was ablr to edutacte you on that point. And as was pointed out in another thread, we OIT grads like to sit around and talk surveying on a Saturday night.

Surveying, love it, live it, ... or go to fresno. ;-)

And you should have seen some of the brookies that we used to catch...

Good thing I didn't read this post before our meeting or we may have not have been so friendly. Yah right! But you are right we did outnumber you at the meeting. I will agree you must have actual work time on your resume before you graduate. When I went there in the dark ages it was encourged and many of us did. Which is why I a lot of us passed the first time we took our PLS.

I enjoyed the meeting and the postive influence it has on my descion making in my practice.

Till next time

RAM

OK Evan,

I agree with you. Once we get learn-edd, we can work towards Professionalism.

Now, If we "Marx a spot here. . .and Marx a spot there. . . would that be Marxism ? No Stallin' now. . . .

Hey, what kind of names do you have for us UOP guys ?

"good"

I think you Marxed that spot too far left. And too much Socializing leads to a lack of productivity. Go right a foot.

No cool names for you UOPs. As far as I know, you guys aren't known for engaging in behavior similar to fresnation (see fresnate).

When I first started, all I did was boundary surveys for court cases and my boss would send me to the courthouse to watch cases involving surveyors every time one came up. I watched a Surveyor loss a $15 Million law suit for Houston Power and Light Company in less then 5 minutes on the stand, all because his survey crews did not clean, peg and/or maintain or check the equipment once they got out of the truck to begin the survey and do it again before they drove away from the site each and every day (and document the test that was performed on the equipment in a field book). Most attorneys don't know surveying but this one did, and he made that surveyor look like a fool.

Remember a Surveyor is the (Only) court expert on measurements, however he/she is only the expert if he/she can stand up in court and say his/her equipment was verified to be correct before he/she started the survey and it was verified to still be correct when he/she finished the survey. If you can't verify that, then you are not much of an expert, are you?

Coy brings up a very good point. How many of us have tested our total stations and GPS units at a preset course lately.

We usually grab the boxes and batteries and go survey. Indeed, i have stated the expected precision of my GPS equipment, in court. All parites were satisfied with my answer, at that time, however, we all should know or realize how easy it is to blow a foot during an RTK survey, if precision problems are not addresed.

Today, we don't clean and oil our GPS units each day, nor do we check our total stations and levels either, so how do we know thatthe results we log in are as correct as they can be ?

I believe each city / county should have a good instrument "course" for users to check at least once a month.

We have our own course near the office, but that was set up with our own equipment.