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Saturday, April 1st, 2023
So I'm staking a few thousand feet of TBC for a few huge warehouses, getting wood into the ground.
Cruising along, and as I'm wrapping up, this guy walks by the stakes and then circles back.
He asks "What does PC and PT mean?"
I respond "That's a great question!".
I pull out the field book and proceed to draw a circle and a few lines and explaining the two curb lines are the tangents, but they'll be called PC point of curvature and PT point of tangency, and can be used interchangeably. He smiles, 'Yes I understand this."
"Are you giving a radius point?"
"No, not for curves this small because it makes it confusing for the layout form crew when they're this close to the PC/PT points."
Today, similar question for a sidewalk(different guy) that is parallel to the TBC fo about 300' then the the TBC departs the pattern in a larger arc and a different degree of curvature, leaving a little bit of space for landscaping and a quandary for them.
I don't have the Radius Point they're looking for(but realized I could calculate it(and won't because it's not our scope of work on this job) and make his life easier) and pulled out the same diagram from previous day and walked him through the same lesson on geometry.
Site super and I talked about it and he gave them the go ahead to just mono pour the Sidewalk and TBC to eliminate the difference in space due to the two different curves and all is ok.
What do you do in the field when the end users start asking you what the stuff on your stakes means, and do you feel comfortable doing that or do you avoid the possibility of them screwing up and blaming you for a mistake?
And Go!!!
Nicely done. Good to see those in the field doing comps. A big topic now days. I believe a lot more surveyors are seeing that they have brought all the comps into the office and it has not done the profession justice. Good capable people truly just never taught. Some don’t want to learn. Some just never been shown how easy it is and have just been placed in a mode that restricts trying this. Others want to know and learn on own.
A great prospect from years ago he was smart as they come very intelligent. Great math skills learned quickly. We are still friends. He left the survey profession became a engineer works on designing submarines. I ask him why he left surveying. He said no mentoring after two companies. He said they wanted him to just get job done. He did and he would ask to learn new things. No one wanted to show him. He found a bust on a set of plans and the cogo points he was given to stake out told office. They said we don’t pay you to check plans just stake the points. He did this on his own time teaching himself. He left and went to another company same type of stuff. Then just said well time for a new career path. Pass that knowledge down as you learn it.
they wanted him to just get job done
don’t pay you to check plans just stake the points.
I've left a few places like that...and hope it hurt too. I'm not going to stake something wrong, because it's says more about me that I would.
the profession deserves a good swift kick, and let the non mentoring non hackers fall off.
have a great weekend!
Reminds me of a discussion with my 16 year-old granddaughter a couple of days ago. She is taking AP Physics, where they have introduced imaginary numbers and i recently. No explanation yet in class as to how they would ever use imaginary numbers. We put everyone else in the room to sleep as we discussed this topic. I got her attention a bit when I brought up exponents and the fact there are the same number of roots as there are powers. For example, two squared is four. What is the square root of four? Two and negative two for a total of two. Second example, two to the fourth power is sixteen. What is the fourth root of sixteen? Two and negative two come to mind. The other two involve the use of the imaginary number i.
Reminds me of a discussion with my 16 year-old granddaughter a couple of days ago. She is taking AP Physics, where they have introduced imaginary numbers and i recently. No explanation yet in class as to how they would ever use imaginary numbers. We put everyone else in the room to sleep as we discussed this topic. I got her attention a bit when I brought up exponents and the fact there are the same number of roots as there are powers. For example, two squared is four. What is the square root of four? Two and negative two for a total of two. Second example, two to the fourth power is sixteen. What is the fourth root of sixteen? Two and negative two come to mind. The other two involve the use of the imaginary number i.
I’m rooting for your Granddaughter.
@holy-cow Oh you are giving me flashbacks. When I first went to the agency and first started doing orbits and EOP. I had to go back and re learn scientific notation. My survey brain wanted to no the area in a way i could mentally see it so I struggled out of the gate seeing things like to the negative 16 power and such. Thats the thing is as a surveyor I think we are in a mindset of that distance error in something we con measurer or its so small we don't care. In that world I was out of my league. I learned but it was a constant battle and now i am reverting the old brain back again to the size of a dime. Lol. Good for you always teaching the kids. That’s things she will remember for ever. We need more parents like you getting involved for sure.
@jitterboogie you to. Have a great one. I am going to walk into the woods and bang my head against a tree as i have been fighting civil 3d all day. Darn us ft international feet and finaly figured out what units setting was not correct. There is only many places to set this stuff. DDunits drawing units autcad units civil 3d units inserting units. Good grief its a wonder anything gets built correctly lol. Why why why. And why is it like this. Lol
The base10 log of 1/2 is -0.3010300
the base10 log of 2 is +0.3010300.
In other words change the sign of the log of any number to get its reciprocal.
I see what you did there. It's St. Pat's day and you slipped a Celtic cross into a survey discussion. 🤣
One of the great things I learned from a high school teacher was that everyone in this world has some purpose. That purpose, however, may be to be used as a bad example.
The mother of one of my high school friends, back in the day, was griping to his younger sister about how she thought his behavior was not up to her standard. The mother said, Why can't he be like Johnny P.?" The sister said, "So, you think he should be a queer?" Mom about keeled over in shock. First, that her darling daughter knew about such behavior. Second, that her daughter would say such a thing out loud. And, third, to learn that young Mr. P. might not be the role model she would want for her son to follow.
Several years later, Mom discovered that the role model she had mentioned definitely did not live up to her expectations. He had become employed at the high school building as a custodian. One early morning, when he was the only person in the building, he set a fire in the library, then called it in, then went and changed into his volunteer fireman gear and helped to battle the blaze that he had started. That was his last day of employment with the school district.
@holy-cow good grief he started a fire and the helped put it out. Sounds llike he missed his calling and should have gone i to that p word. Create a problem to solve. Lol.
This is what brought the problem to an end. There had been several mysterious fires at old farmsteads in the area with the barn being on fire for no obvious reason. It turned out he had been the one who set all of those fires, too. A long stint in a State-operated mental institution solved the problem.
Incredibly, I did a survey for him about 15 years ago so he could build a privacy fence around his house in the next county over. He told me none of the neighbors wanted him living in THEIR neighborhood. So, out of sight, out of mind.
@holy-cow wow. Geezers. Well maybe they got him some help. Ya just never know I reckon.
I see what you did there. It's St. Pat's day and you slipped a Celtic cross into a survey discussion. 🤣
shhhhhhhh!
Damn you!
I'll have your legs! (IRA threat they used to hurl)
no religion or politics...that is pure geometry pal.
😎 😉
@holy-cow good grief he started a fire and the helped put it out. Sounds llike he missed his calling and should have gone i to that p word. Create a problem to solve. Lol.
more common than you think in the fire service.
