Out now is our double summer issue of Mensura!

View the pdf here

In the TSA hosted seminar at this year’s Geo Business show, host Oliver Viney was pleased to report that theft figures were slightly down on last year. However, incidents are still occurring and remaining vigilant and using the tracking/locking technology available – and publicising the use of this technology as a deterrent – remain key to fighting theft in our industry.

Our thanks go to Scott McGrane, Senior site Engineer at McGrane S.E.S Ltd for sharing this latest story of an instrument successfully recovered thanks to Trimble’s L2P (Locate2Protect) tracking technology and for his appreciation of the KOREC team who he says were extremely responsive and helpful.

Scott reports that during a Wednesday night, late in June, site offices where he was working in Cambridge were broken into and a Trimble S5 Total Station stolen along with other construction equipment. When this was discovered first thing on Thursday morning, the Police were informed and Scott called KOREC to see if the instrument could be tracked. By 8.30 am we had already provided Scott with a screen grab and coordinates of the stolen S5, 2.5 hours away at a building site in Birmingham. We were able to inform him when the instrument was later moved to an open location where any confrontation was extremely unlikely. Scott recovered his instrument from a skip a few minutes away from the Birmingham site. He believes that the S5 was sold to an engineer who was then tipped off that the instrument was tracked and consequently dumped.

Happily, the instrument was found to be in full working order with no damage. Police are investigating and the remaining stolen construction equipment has not been located.

Exciting times at KOREC – we’ve long since brought you ground breaking technology that sets KOREC customers apart from the opposition and now we’re supporting these world class products with an even higher level of service through our new ‘wraparound care’.  This new level of service and support will be delivered through the launch of KOREC Professional Services and an enriched KOREC Hire Service.

See our new announcement below or download the pdf here.

Our aim is to bring you great technology, made more accessible through a choice of purchase hire or as a service, backed up by expert care and consultancy by KOREC partnering or working with you as much or as little as you require,

Here’s a taste of what we’ve got on offer!

View the video here

New level of ‘wraparound services’ for KOREC customers

KOREC is offering a new level of service which will enable it to partner with customers from the outset, supporting them in winning more business from the tendering process through to field data collection and the final provision of intelligent, timely deliverables.

This new level of service will provide KOREC customers with an approach designed to supply solutions to problems rather than just products. This will include providing customers with cost-effective access to sector expertise, generally not available in-house, and ground breaking technology principally regarded as outside a capital outlay.

The provision of this service will be through KOREC Professional Services (specialising in mobile mapping surveys) and an enriched KOREC Hire Service backed up by dedicated field and office support.

Professional Services: Providing all survey and engineering companies, from sole operators to national businesses, with a low risk, no outlay method of adding mobile mapping to their portfolio. Key benefits include:

  1. Expansion of your business by offering clients mobile mapping surveys, and all their benefits, without the need for a hefty capital outlay or training costs.
  2. Access to the full range of Trimble field to finish mobile mapping solutions including the MX2, MX7, and new generation MX9.
  3. Safe delivery of highway projects faster and without the need for traffic management or road closures
  4. Access to expert advice, services and consultancy at every stage of a project through data capture, processing, hosting and delivery.
  5. Quality assured deliverables from KOREC’s experienced mobile mapping team.

Mark Reid, KOREC Professional Services Director said, “We are in a new era of customer care and customer expectation which is best met with an approach that supplies solutions rather than just products. Key to KOREC Professional Services is the idea of working or partnering with the customer to identify their project requirements and develop the most appropriate solution which we will then help them implement either through service, hire or purchase. In short, we want to work with our customers more closely to ensure that they get access to the best solutions available to deliver their projects successfully, first time.”

KOREC Hire: KOREC is equipped to offer a vast range of solutions for hire from entry level construction tools to leading-edge technology including scanning, plug and play monitoring systems, drones and rail track measurement devices.

Key benefits include:

  1. Dedicated field and office support for every instrument
  2. Complimentary, comprehensive ‘technical handover’ for instrument familiarisation
  3. Fast delivery – next day is the norm
  4. Well stocked fleet – fast reaction to short notice requests
  5. Cost-effective access to new technology and instruments that can expand a business’s offering

Mark Crawford, KOREC, Strategic Business Manager for Hire, said “Support is key to what we do at KOREC and our hire fleet is backed up by a trained, field and office support team with a single aim – to keep our customers productive in the field. The breadth of KOREC’s hire offering allows us to resolve the daily challenges our customers face, whether that is the need for a laser, total station or GPS on short and long term projects, a ‘Plug and Play’ multi-environment monitoring system to deploy and initialise quickly on site or taking the next step and considering a Trimble SX10 Scanning Total Station or the GEDO IMS system to increase productivity within an already demanding delivery plan.”

With 20 years of experience working with KOREC’s rail customers, our Rail and Monitoring Business Area Manager Matthew Lock, knows that one of the biggest drivers behind the take up of technology on rail projects is the need for productivity. Matthew uses this piece to run through the advantages that the different methods of scanning can bring:

I have been fortunate enough to work with rail customers for around 20 years now and one of their major focuses is on productivity­­­­­be it mobile or static, and at KOREC we are fortunate to be able to offer a variety of Trimble solutions, from the MX9 Mobile Mapping System and GEDO TMD to the TX8 3D Laser Scanner and SX10 Scanning Total Station.

The MX9 clearly offers huge productivity benefits as it can collect data at the maximum permissible railroad vehicle RV speed, or even potentially be train mounted. Using static scan data offers the highest levels of accuracy, but the GEDO Track Measuring Device using the optional Inertial Measurement Unit offers very high quality pointcloud data at walking pace, meaning 2,000 metres per hour is possible.

Collecting the data is great, but customer deliverables are key and this is where Trimble software, particularly Gedo Scan Office shine. Processing the data from the GEDO TMD is very efficient and there are a number of smart algorithms to help generate the information the customer needs, meaning the office work is as productive as the field work. The pointcloud can be used to automatically generate linear data like rail tracks, platforms and cable troughing by using the track detection and shape tracing tools, which analyse the pointcloud and fit the specified template through it.

The clearance around the railway can also be analysed in more detail using Gedo Scan Office. We can animate the path of a train along the track and can check if there are any areas of concern which become automatically highlighted. This algorithm can also take into account the 3D elements of the wagon if known, rather than using a simple cross-section to create a more accurate clearance model.

We also have the ability to create any rail vehicle as a custom wagon, perfect if you need to check a new piece of rolling stock or plant will fit on to your particular section of infrastructure – will it damage a bridge or tunnel and how is vegetation affecting rolling stock clearance?

The newest algorithm is the OLE detector tool which enables the overhead lines to be generated with the click of a mouse.

Within just a few minutes hundreds of metres of wires can be automatically generated and exported as 3D CAD lines. Not only that, but the heights and staggers (relationship between the wire and rail geometry) are also automatically generated as part of the detection process and can then be exported as text files or spreadsheets.

All this functionality is focused on letting our rail customers deliver the data their clients need as efficiently as possible. Best of all, data from the MX9, GEDO TMD, TX8 and SX10 can all be integrated into Gedo Scan Office, so you an gain the functionality you need from the best hardware for the job.

Trimble advertise the Trimble TSC7 as military-spec with rugged design. However, up until now, we’ve never had the opportunity to test this out. It’s therefore a big thank you to the KOREC customer who did this for us!

An experienced land surveyor, our customer was delighted to find himself furnished with a Trimble SX10 and TSC7 logger in his new job along with a new truck, all be it one that was still waiting for the back rack. At the end of a recent job, with rain falling and nowhere to place kit on the truck, the surveyor carefully balanced his TSC7 on the wheel, under the arch and out of the rain, whilst he loaded the remaining boxes.

Unfortunately, that’s where it stayed and the surveyor was unaware of this until he felt the truck wheel bump over an object on the ground.

The panicked surveyor immediately called his office to report the accident to a very understanding boss. KOREC was contacted and a next day TSC7 replacement arranged through our surveying equipment hire service. On closer inspection, the TSC7 screen, beneath the screen saver, was found to be undamaged and the unit was consequently dispatched to Germany for repairs where it was found to be fully functional apart from a cracked outer casing!

Our thanks to the customer for sharing this story of the TSC7’s rugged with photographic evidence.

Survey companies across the UK have been consistently targeted by thieves so it was good to see a TSA session hosted by TSA Council Member and Member and Managing Director of Atlantic Geomatics, Oliver Viney. This session brought together a panel to discuss the latest initiatives, share success stories and inform everyone involved of recent developments. Although the police representative, Tom Harding, Chief Superintendent, West Mercia Police, was unable to make it for operational reasons, the discussion was lively and informative. Thefts are slightly down on last year and this is partly attributed to the arrest of a prominent gang at the end of 2018 and also to the arrival of more deterrents from both manufacturers and the likes of SmartWater (liquid marking/intelligence portal) and Datatag ID (multi-layered tagging and registration).

In 2018 TSA and SmartWater formed an alliance to deliver detailed analysis and police follow-up on every incident of equipment theft. The alliance is sponsored by Trimble, Topcon and Leica Geosystems. However, a show of hands from those attending the session illustrated a key area for improvement. Whilst many victims of instrument theft informed the manufacturer, only a low percentage informed SmartWater.

This is very detrimental to the proposal of any police operation because SmartWater needs to supply evidence of crime hotspots or ‘clusters’ for police engagement in operations such as planted instruments. Unfortunately, GDPR prevents manufacturers and SmartWater sharing information so it’s VITAL that any thefts are also reported to SmartWater via TSA – see side box. Other advice includes the suggestion that every company should have a stolen equipment policy in place with details on who to contact and what information is required.

Finally, TSA urges everyone to remember personal safety comes first! A free Briefing Note on Theft Mitigation Measures and accompanying A4 Poster can be downloaded at https://www.tsa-uk.org.uk/downloads/

The panel included Chair Oliver Viney (TSA Council Member and Managing Director of Atlantic Geomatics), Ian Pennington (Trimble), John Fraser (Hexagon Geosystems), Simon Crowhen (Topcon Positioning), Rachael Oakley SmartWater, Dave Luscombe (Datatag ID) and Andy Barton (Jelf Insurance Brokers).

In the event of a theft or attempted theft:

TSA has an official agreement with SmartWater for the reporting of ALL survey equipment theft, or attempted theft. This can be done directly through TSA’s website. SmartWater works closely with the police to ensure every incident of survey equipment theft receives detailed analysis and follow-up.

1 Follow the link www.tsa-uk.org.uk/equipment-theft

2 Download the incident form.

3 Complete the spreadsheet, including as much detail as possible.

4 Send, together with any supporting information such as photos

or videos, to donotreplyanalysts@smartwater.com

TBC 5.1 and Access 2019.00 have just come out.

Trimble Access version 2019.00 includes a new CAD toolbar to simplify linework creation and support for web map services for map background data. It also provides improvements to scan data display, and Favourites and Functions. IFC enhancements include improved display and layer control, faster model loading, support for large coordinate system translations, and the ability to create the center point on a surface for staking and measure to IFC surfaces.

Trimble Access version 2019.00 is now a 64-bit application and the following apps are available now: General Survey, Roads, Tunnels, Mines, Pipelines and Monitoring.

View the release notes here:

TBC 5.1

Tutorial Video

Access 2019.00

Tutorial video

Improvements include:

Trimble Access 2019.00

TBCv 5.10

Great to see Geomatics World featuring our latest KOREC Trimble SX10 case study on the front page of the May/June issue! Our thanks to The Greenhatch Group Engineering Manager, Jordan Knight, for providing the information for this story on the monitoring of the rugged and beautiful area around the site of the new Tintagel bridge. The monitoring work was undertaken on behalf of English Heritage.

You can read more about this project in our case study.

 

GeoConnexionUK has also used its May/June issue to highlight how the exploitation of two very different Trimble technologies (The R10 and Trimble Catalyst) can be used in the fight against the invasive plant, knotweed. In our ‘Whacking the Weed’ article, written with Tom Goodman of TP Knotweed, we outline how TP Knotweed’s take up of GPS is just part of its overall commitment to IT and innovation – a strategy that drives the company and is a great example to many other industries.

Read the piece here.

The May/June issue of GeoConnexion UK features Chris’s final column for KOREC. Who will replace him? Watch this space for full details!

Meanwhile, Chris used his last outing to argue that while technology has done much to speed fieldwork, equipping geospatial professionals with tools and applications that can generate compelling deliverables ‘straight-out of the box’ is a much-needed next step.

You can read his final column here.