User Manual: RTK Calibrated Surveyor Kit

Overview

Traditional survey performance at affordable cost. Includes accessories.
With the RTK Calibrated Surveyor Kit you will have everything you need to start your surveying tasks with RTK and centimeter level accuracy.

Package

You got your new RTK Calibrated Surveyor Kit? First things first, follow this quick guidelines to get your kit set up for it.

Remember all the component parts of RTK Calibrated Surveyor Kit includes:

ZED-F9P RTK receiver with USB and Bluetooth inside a plastic case
Survey calibrated antenna with 1.5m TNC-SMA cable
Mini USB cable
USB OTG microUSB-B (14cm)
USB OTG type C (22cm)
Universal smartphone holder with 3M-Backed Rubber Pads, fits any smartphone from 5.3cm to 9.3cm with or without case
Clamp to hold the smartphone holder to the pole
Velcro strap (20cm) to fix the receiver to the back of the smartphone holder
Surveying Pole for survey GNSS antenna

The kit is pre-configured to send NMEA data simultaneously via Bluetooth and USB.

Unboxing

For building RTK Calibrated Surveyor Kit, there is no need for special tools nor nothing of the sort, by hand will be enough.

1. Start by mounting the receiver to the smartphone holder. You will need the velcro strap, the plastic case (ZED-F9P receiver with USB and Bluetooth 2.0 within) and the universal smartphone.

2. Place the case together with the smartphone holder with the SMA connector inversely positioned to the smartphone holder width adjusting screw. You may observe that the flat face of the case fits with the back of the smartphone holder. Fasten it together with the Velcro strap.

3. Next, assemble the clamp that will hold the smartphone holder to the pole. There are 3 different components that form the clamp.

4. Join the main parts of the clamp with the preferred screw. Each screw fits different screw holes within the clamp. You can screw in both and decide which may work best for you. Then, screw tightly together the rotating part of the clamp that will serve to rotate the smartphone holder to your preferred position.

5. Screw in the clamp to the smartphone holder. You can remove the unused screw of the clamp if convenient.

6. You can adjust freely the position of the smartphone holder by loosing up the rotating piece of the clamp and fixing it at your will.

7. You can adjust freely the position of the smartphone holder by loosing up the rotating piece of the clamp and fixing it at your will.

Now you have the first piece of your Surveyor Kit ready to connect with the other remaining two main pieces: your smartphone and the Calibrated Survey antenna.

8. To connect your smartphone to the receiver, you may place first your smartphone to the smartphone holder, adjusting it to the width of your phone.

9. You can now connect the smartphone to the receiver with the different cable sets of your kit. Connect the mini USB cable to the mini USB board connector of ZED-F9P receiver and the USB OTG cable suitable for your phone. Then, connect this to your phone.

10. You can leave the cables loose (above) or you may wish to knot up the cables or fast them with the Velcro strap to tighten them in and get them out of the way (below).

11. Now, you can proceed connecting the receiver to the Survey antenna. Connect the TNC-K to SMA cable (within Survey antenna box) to the SMA connector of ZED-F9P receiver

12. Fasten the clamp to the surveying pole.

13. Add on top of the pole the Survey antenna turning it delicately to the right until it stops.

14. Finally, connect the TNC-K end of the cable to the Survey antenna and adjust the surveying pole to the convenient height.

15. You now got your RTK Calibrated Surveyor Kit built and ready to work!

How to connect to your smartphone?

We will explain how to use your Android device with RTK Calibrated Surveyor Kit.

Make sure your device supports Bluetooth 2.0 or has USB OTG capabilities.

Make sure your Android language is set to English, since some users reported compatibility problems with other languages.

Place your RTK Calibrated Surveyor Kit in a location with good view of the sky, or near a window for testing the functionality.

Download compatible software/app which you prefer to use from Google Play and install it in your device. We prepared step-by-step instructions how to use RTK Calibrated Surveyor Kit with several software/app:
- SW Maps – GIS & Data Collector. You can download the app here.
- Mapit GIS (upcoming)
- Field Navigator (upcoming)
- Other app. The list of compatible software/app you can find here.

How to use RTK Calibrated Surveyor Kit with SW Maps?

CONNECTION VIA USB OTG

CONNECTION VIA BLUETOOTH

CONNECTION VIA USB OTG

CONNECTION VIA BLUETOOTH

Since you have a RTK capable GNSS receiver, let’s connect it to a NTRIP server to get cm accuracy. Go back to SW Maps menu and select NTRIP Connection
Fill all the fields with your NTRIP provider data. Make sure to check Send NMEA GGA to NTRIP Caster if you are connecting to a VRS.
When you click CONNECT, if everything worked, you will see the data stream alive
You can see some details of your Ardusimple receiver by going to the SW Maps menu and selecting GPS Status or Skyplot
In the main screen, you can click the button shown in the below picture to make the app center the map in your receiver location. The pointer showing your location will change its color depending on the fix status of your receiver. You can change the map layer, add points, tracks, export/import recorded locations and much more.
You can get used to the SW Maps app by trying the different options, but if you are looking for a manual you can find it here: http://swmaps.softwel.com.np/

How to use RTK Calibrated Surveyor Kit with Other software?

If you need to use RTK Calibrated Surveyor Kit with any other software, we will explain how to configure Ardusimple RTK receivers to be used as mock location for Android smartphones/tablets in order to get centimeter position accuracy.

If you are not familiar with the term, mock location means that you cheat your Android device to use an external GNSS receiver as if it was its own internal one.
This has the advantage that any GPS/GNSS app that works with your Android device can benefit of centimeter level accuracy.

This step only needs to be done once.
We will use Lefebure NTRIP Client app both to get NTRIP corrections and to use mock location for Android.
Go to the Play Store and install the app, we will configure it later.

This step only needs to be done once.
To enable mock locations in Android we will need to get Developer permissions. The procedure may vary slightly between different Android versions and smartphone models (you can Google your “Smartphone model + enable mock location” if you can’t find the exact options).
On Android 4.1 and lower, the Developer options screen is available by default. On Android 4.2 and higher, you must enable this screen. To enable developer options, tap the Build Number, MIUI version or similar option 7 times. You can find this option in one of the following locations, depending on your Android version:
- Settings > About Phone > Build Number
- Settings > System > About Phone > Build Number
Once you have access to Developer options, you can go to Settings > Additional Settings and at the bottom you will find Developer options. In this big list, tap Select mock location app and select Lefebure NTRIP Client from the list.

Check that you have your RTK Calibrated Surveyor Kit powered by connecting USB cable to your smartphone/tablet/power source.
If you get any popup message to connect the USB device with any app, you can ignore it (unless you want to connect via USB OTG, which is covered in this other tutorial).
Enable your smartphone/tablet Bluetooth, and pair it with your RTK Calibrated Surveyor Kit.
When pairing your device, notice that it may appear as simpleRTK2B or as a generic MAC number (e.g.: F0:0A:95:9D:68:16).
The password is always 1234.
The pairing only needs to be done once.

Take following steps:
- Open Lefebure NTRIP Client
- Click on the gear icon to enter the setup menu
- Select Receiver Settings and set:
  - Receiver Connection to External via Bluetooth.
  - Bluetooth Device to the name of the simpleRTK2B BT connection.
  - GPS Mock Locations check.
  - You can also add the Antenna Height if you are performing high accuracy surveying tasks.
  - You can additionally log the GPS or NTRIP Data by checking the options.
- Go back to the main settings menu and select NTRIP settings.
- Set your NTRIP service credentials (Caster IP, Caster Port, Username and Password).
These are Ardusimple credentials shown only as an example, use your own 🙂

These settings need to be done only once unless you change your NTRIP credentials.
- - Go to the main screen and click the CONNECT button.
  - Once the connection with the server is stablished, the app will ask you to select the NTRIP station from which you want to receive the corrections.
  - If everything is properly set you will see a yellow progress bar that will download corrections continuously

Open your favorite GPS/GNSS application and use it as usual.
You will be using the external RTK GNSS receiver instead of the smartphone/tablet internal GPS receiver
We have tested this functionality with many apps, you can find them in this link.
If you test it in other apps, you can send us an email at info@ardusimple.com and we will add it to the list.
The Android robot is reproduced or modified from work created and shared by Google and used according to terms described in the Creative Commons 3.0 Attribution License.

Now you are ready to survey and map!

EU Conformity & RoHS Certificates

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RTK Calibrated Surveyor Kit
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