LS as a network rover?

Duane Frymire

Active Member
Quick update. I was in my backyard which has about a 30% opening, but usually I can get a quick fix 90% of the time with my other rover. But it wasn't set up in the same location(closer to a fence on top of a 4' retaining wall. Once I moved it to my regular spot, I got a couple fixes. My other rover also likes to exaggerate the accuracy while the precision is usually off. I think the LS doesn't play that game. Which I appreciate. I also took both rover heads on a field trip out to a site and along the drive observed the rate of a time to fix/hold and noticed they both did pretty well. It was only about a mile drive, but I plan on doing some more testing. Just haven't had the chance.

Quick question. My state (Massachusetts) has it's own public CORS network. The nearest station is 1.3 miles away, the other nearest CORS stations are about 20 miles away (I'm within the green triangle on the MATB station. 90% of my work is within 3 miles of it. I've always gone with network corrections, but was wondering if a single baseline might produce better results? I think I'm splitting hairs, but figured I'd ask.

Thanks for the help guys!
Nearest should give better results within 5-6 miles of the station. imax and vrs are using intepolated data, so a better use when all stations 20 miles away (although I would (do) use base/rover in that case instead).
 

Shawn Billings

Shawn Billings
5PLS
When working with an RTN, there are always caveats. Typically nearest will be better, but it might depend on the available signals. If you're using a Triumph-LS Plus with multi-constellations, you're likely going to want the station that supports multi-constellation corrections. If the nearest is GPS+GLO only, then it's possibly not the best for your purposes. In general, I prefer my own base for several reasons. I do think that generally a given rover is going to give the best results with base data from the same brand. The way the receiver interprets data is still somewhat proprietary from what I can discern. There are generally accepted approaches to how signals are interpreted but it's not always a given. Those inconsistencies can lead to performance issues. RTNs are supposed to be designed to provide corrections that work with everyone, but I suspect there are performance gains to be had with keeping the base and rover in the same family. I also like having my own base, because I can remove some of the variables in RTK surveying: I know the source of the coordinate at the base, I know the corrections will be available when I arrive at my job site.

Having said that, I have deep appreciation for RTN's but I would never expect an RTN to provide the same level of performance as I will get with my own base.
 

Duane Frymire

Active Member
And if you're using RTN don't forget to monitor station status. I'm not sure what MA has for that, but NY has a twitter feed or you can go to the website, VT will send email notifications. But you have to sign up for the notifications, they don't come automatically because you have an account. And generally don't get notifications for 10 minutes of data that didn't pass quality control measures (you can see that on NY nysnet website though), but only for actual outages due to upgrades or software/hardware issues. Most, maybe all, of the calls I get having trouble I find are due to the stations being used have some sort of issue during that time.
RTN's are great and getting better, but you do need to keep track of them like any other equipment.
 
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