Essay Example on A description of the use and benefits of electronic surveying instruments

The Tellurometer is an electronic distance measurement device that uses high frequency radio waves or microwaves This highly portable instrument works on 12 to 24 volt batteries and can be used day or night Two Fluorometers are required to measure distances of up to 100 kilometres A highly skilled person needs to be at each end of the surveyed area to take measurements One Tellurometer is then used as the master and the other as the remote unit Electronic Theodolite The electronic Theodolite is a measurement unit that is used to determine horizontal and vertical angles in a certain area The horizontal and vertical readings are displayed simultaneously on an LCD panel Total Station A Total Station is a lightweight instrument integrating the technology of an electronic or digital theodolite an electronic distance measuring device and a microprocessor in the same unit It is used for distance and angular measurement data processing digital display of point details and data storage in an electronic field book The digital panel displays the distances angles heights and the coordinates of the observed area A microprocessor applies corrections for the Earth's curvature and refraction automatically Global Positioning System 

The level of accuracy sought will directly influence many other factors such as type of instrumentation expertise of personnel sophistication of software reasonable cost of survey field operations etc The primary non hardware dependent accuracy limitations are due to errors in the satellite ephemerides and atmospheric uncertainties both requiring special software processing for very high accuracy surveys Cost benefit Issues such as the capital cost of equipment ongoing operational costs data processing costs development training and maintenance costs This can best be measured according to productivity electronic surveying instruments used can be estimated during the planning phase It needs to be established whether the competing technologies offer lower costs In addition the benefits that they receive when using the Total Station are Quick setup of the instrument on the tripod by utilizing the laser plummet Programmed with on board area computation for computing the area of a field It supports local languages It shows the graphical view of land and plots No recording and writing errors It gives more accurate measurements than other conventional surveying instruments Data can be saved and transferred to a PC It has integrated database Computerization of old maps All in one and multitasking instrument from surveying to GIS creation by using the appropriate software Faster work saves time quick finishing off the job