battlefield archaeology need to transform total station points to actual points, have UTM for instrument and backsight
Thank you for your help,
as a graduate student i needed surveying done. and could not find any volunteers so took my limited experience and bought used instrument. i was trained to set up the instrument and backsight with an additional point at a right angle, so one corner of a square was the instrument and you had a north and east point. on my projects i set up instrument to be strategic so i would not need to move and then shoot a backsight longer than my anticipated furthest point. in some cases that failed but that was more the process of a non-professional. But i did borrow a GPS that used GPS and GLONASS and have all but a few of my instrument locations and backsights in UTM for PA State Plane South. My sites are on the Brandywine battlefield NHL. i am a doctoral candidate at Temple University in Philadelphia and ABD. So for instance i have point using TOPCON software the old software TOPCON-Link i can convert my 0,0,0, instrument location (although i usually buried the Y-axis) and my BS to the UTM, but how can i take the remaining points and somehow spreadsheet them to format into the 2D location or if really fortunate the #D SS, Also, i have areas where my datum was an x-y landmark, so let’s say 3 feet at 220 degrees from an iron post. then i pulled tape N-S, E-W and have feet imperial in an arbitrary N-E format. but again can load the landmark, meaning, fence post into my ArcMAP calculate the northing and easting grid base lines and in a similar fashion hope to take a dimension 120’west, -40’north to be 2D Point Shapefile in ArcMAP with proper location to the fence-post-datum, which can then be stretched to connect to known UTM for other instrument locations. Basically i had an old TOPCON Unit which had a bad keypad one side but was calibrated, the set up was good, but on some days i was unable to use because of livestock. i also was able to borrow and shot some points using the Robotic, but again did not know how to make the instrument and BS UTM at the start, so points are all basically SS – but again, i took the Antenna out and got GPS/GLONASS readings spread out over between 9 and 11 hours then averaged. The goal is the first ever linkage of archaeological investigations on the Brandywine battlefield. My thesis is on predictive modeling of areas of battlefield activity and i have the joy of writing that my results exceeded my expectations. This is why points which are acceptable for a sight plan must be upgraded to all conform to the PA State Plane South NAD83.
I’ve been drilling down on COGO but i am in time trouble completing my dissertation so hope someone sees this that can offer suggestions.
my name is kevin donaghy, doctoral candidate Temple University Philadelphia PA, (UPENN-CGS 05′, ABD Temple)
my email is [email protected]
i do not have my university email since i am late completing my dissertation, i am a full time worker, and single dad when i started my path, 9 years to get BA-Anthropology, and started in PhD program in 2007. To keep email i needed to apply for extension and pay a semester of tuition. this project with the exception of about 1600 USD in grants and personal gifts, kept me broke and credit cards maxed until i finally got caught up about a year ago. I’m on the home stretch, i really need help, and i hope this forum enables me to complete the dataset my way, and if not, no worries, i will manage but in the bigger picture, part of my research makes the point that graduate students in archaeology need support to enable professional surveying for our research, instead of basically leaving , in this case, myself to my own devices. I just find that calling surveyors and Engineers in my area for help to be a non-starter, even back in 08-09 with the slow down in construction i couldn’t get professional volunteers. i’m not whining, i just don’t want you folks to think i’m stupid or lazy, i begged and begged, finally got a break on an instrument granted bought with all calibrated, but had bad keypad, and even now i’m using software that is so obsolete even the one guy who helps me said he has to remember how it works. i did lose an important day of points, so wondering if there is some sort of TOPCON NCSI who can go into the data chip and find the deleted dat where it is residing, since the instrument has not been used in the hope there is a way to retrieve, but again, we took many photos, the site that day was maybe 60 x 110′ rectangle, and features in photos and video are recorded on other days’ SS’s. so it means maybe 45 points will need a different image icon to indicate they are visually estimated. Again, i know you are all shuddering and i know less than nothing but welcome to my world i’m sorry to say, Good point is i am an advocate for professional surveying on student projects and i have given presentations in Germany, Hungary, and Ireland, and will be at the Fields of Conflict Conference in Edinburgh, Sept 2020
Please be a part of making history and help a fellow out,
Sincerely,
kev
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