Just a thought after using a calibration course with a length of 500 meters...

Some calibration course are measured to a set length like 500 meters or 1000 meters. In order to make on-side calculations even easier, seems on could make the length of the calibration course such that it would include the 1.001 adjustment factor, then the calculation of the constant would even easier to do...see table below.

I, for one, would not want a cal course certified as including the SCPF. It may be fine for the person that set it out, but if someone else uses it, they may not figure out that the SCPF is already included in the length. Thus, their measurements would be off.

This would not likely be the case with another measurer that does many courses, but when you get a one-off measurer, they have enough difficulty comprehending everything that is thrown at them. You add a calibration course that "includes" the SCPF, and they may mess it up.

It is an interesting concept, though. I have a 1200' cal course, so I could extend it 14.4", and my SCPF is there. Flip side, though - my Excel spreadsheet takes care of that. Since I use a laptop on-site, it doesn't save me any time to have my course include the SCPF.

I received an application for a calibration course with the SCPF built in, back when I was a baby certifier in 1980 or so. While I admired the thought that went into it, I resisted certifying it at other than its true length.

It would be dreadfully confusing to have two kinds of calibration courses out there, some certified at true distance and some at (true x 1.001), and no ready way to tell the difference. There may have been more of a reason to do this back when calculators were rare or expensive, but the need is now long gone.

I can see no problem if someone wanted to lay out a calibration course at 300.30 meters or 1001.00 feet, but the certification would be for those previous values, and not for 300.00 or 1000.00. This would leave the measurer free to perform his calculation trick if he wants to. I still think it's not a good idea.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Pete Riegel,

Thanks for the responses...

My statement of
"length of the calibration course such that it would include the 1.001 adjustment factor" was unclear....my intent would be that the measured calibration course would be measured and certified as 1,001 m or 500.5 m not certified as 1,000 m or 500 m.
Then to calculate the constant for 1,000 m, for the 500.5 m calibration course it would be the average count times 2. For the 1,001 m course, the average count would be the 1,000 m constant.

My thought on this thread was that if the calibration course is being set to a specific length to make it easier to do the constant calculation, then these "other" distances would make it very easy. Thread initiated as a point of discussion and thought - not as a recommendation.

For myself, I always use an Excel spreadsheet so doesn't matter much.