My work entails a lot of surveying of existing buildings and then drawing up the plans on TurboCad. For years I've been just using a laser measuring tool and doing a hand sketch from which I would do a Cad drawing back at the Office using TurboCAD. I have recently been on the look out for a package that could be used on a tablet which would, preferably take the input from the Leica laser measuring device and draw the plan as I went along. I have been trialling Restick SiteCad which connects to the Leica laser tool via Bluetooth so the measurement is drawn as a CAD drawing. I have Redstick SiteCad on my Android tablet and it seems to work OK but with a few niggles. It then exports the drawing as a DXF file which I can then email to myself. I was just wondering if anyone else has had experience of using such packages to speed up site surveys?

Wow,

How things have changed...............I thought I'd made a giant leap forward when I upgraded from paces to a 30m tape!

Best Regards
Bob

Gotta keep up with the technology Bob, or you get left behind. It seems to advance exponentially these days. The big leap for me was going from the drawing board to CAD and that was 24 years ago. Blimey it makes you feel old when you say that doesn't it  :-)

Obviously no one uses Turbocad for doing site surveys?

There is one! Yourself

Hi Nick
You are not all alone, i also do site surveys, but until i read your first post in this tread i did it with paper and pencil like i have done for the last nearly 30 years.
After reading your post i bang my head in the wall and spoke some words i will not tell on this forum, why i dont think that there could be a tool for this
So that evening you sort of cost me 1 200 $, as i have to by a new tablet ( the old one i give to my son 1 year ago, and i dont think it would have been popular if i take back:)
Bying the Pro version of Redstick Cad and started to test, very simple to learn/ use, even if i just have tested on one project so far i can see the benefits of using it.
And so simple to just send the DXF to my mail, download and import to TC.
The only thing i think is a bit dissapointing so far is the stair tool and that when saving to DXF i only get a 2D drawing, save as IFC give me a 3D drawing of the project, but i can live with that until TC start to read IFC file's. 
I dont understand what's the big difference to the " Pro Data " version, so i guess i have to send a question about this to Redstick
But for sure, for me that many time not understand my own handwriting/ measurement after 3-4 weeks it was a great tool i'm looking forward to learn more about.

Torfinn

IMSI/Design has several different options on their TurboApps site, though I haven't tried any.

Hi John
Yes, if you like Apple, i dont
So IMSI need to speed up the "Android train" if they want to selling me one App.

Torfinn

The iPad belongs to the wife, but I get to use on occasion. 

I've got a couple of 10" tabs with 8Gb, 64-bit Win 7 and 64-bit TC,(MSI and Gigabite, older low-power CPUs, good batteries but not great, 3-6 hours depending), and a couple of 8" tabs, Acer W3 and Asus T80 (Acer's battery's an all-day one, Asus lasts 4-5 hours, but charges on USB charger or pocket backup battery.  The Asus has a digitising Wacom stylus, which is nice).  All run TC, the 10"ers 64-bit, the 8"ers 32-bit, and I find it's easiest to use with these small devices with minimal toolbars, tools accessed through palettes, unless I'm connected to a monitor, mouse and keyboard.   Win 7 and 8 have handwriting recognition, too, Torfinn, and it works pretty well, even when I'm scrawling with a fat fingertip.

IMSI/Design has several different options on their TurboApps site, though I haven't tried any.

Hi John and thanks for the reply. I had a look at theturboapps site but I'm a little confused as the apps all seem to be for using .dwg files which are Autocad. We're talking Turbocad which is .TCW which is strange that they don't seem to accommodate their own file type, or am I missing something here ??

Torfinn and Murray, I use an android. Like Torfinn, I've never been much into Apple products ever since AutoCad stopped having a version for Apple, and I think they're overpriced. Torfinn, I think also that as far as I'm concerned, one advantage of the Redstick SiteCad is the ability for me to press my laser measuring tool and have the figure transferred via Bluetooth into SiteCad and actually draw the line at the correct length. A great tool for eliminating any errors between measuring and writing on a sketch. I think the basic difference between the standard version and the pro is that the Pro has more tools for dropping in furniture etc.
I tried it out on doing a survey of a meeting hall the other day and it seemed to work pretty good, although I found also that the stair tool needs some getting used to. The fact that it is a 2D drawing is fine for me.

.dwg appeals to a much wider audience (potential market) than TC users only.  I had a little Android tab and checked out Turboviewer with files from other apps as well as TC, and it plays nicely with all of them.  In Turboviewer, .dwg's a pretty good presentation format, 2D and 3D.   

I have a Leica D5 that still working good, so now when testing i dont want to by a new one with bluetooth for the moment.
If i understand it correct there is 3 version, Standard, Pro ( with some furniture ) and Pro Data, and i believe that there is a possebility to save different kind of wall types in Pro Data, but i'm not sure and thats why i will send a question to them so they can give some more info about it before i use 300 $ more up to that version.

I also think if they can make a IFC in 3D it should also be possible to make a DXF in 3D, then the wall's and window/ doors alredy stand in correct position, when inserting to TC

About that Imsi apps make dwg make sense for me, how many program can use DWG compared with TCW, = how many potencial customers, we dont have problems with taking a dwg in to TC anyway.

Torfinn

I wouldn't see a problem with dwg format if TurboCad let you select a default setting to save as dwg but it defaults to tcw. That means I have to remember everytime to save as dwg else when I'm on site and access a drawing on the cloud with the app I find it doesn't open it. It's almost like saying "buy TurboCad because we want your money but AutoCad is a better package so we're going to support that file type" 

 
Yes, there is a sort of missmatch there.

Torfinn

TC defaults to its own file type because properties, part tree info and associativity is retained in .TCW.  Saving as .dwg essentially explodes everything.  It's a useful neutral presentation format, but a .dwg file is dumb if you're using constraints or 3D - and if you save as .dwg and dump the .tcw, there's no getting them smarts back....

All the more reason to develop an app that uses .tcw file types. It just winds me up a bit that they don't follow through with the same program type. It's all a bit half-hearted. 

Then i get a message back and it's basically possebillity to add data to the buildingparts for calculation of energy class etc .
Alredy have a calculator for that, made for the Norwegian system/ rules, so then i will be happy with the Pro version and save 300 $

The only thing that could be of interest is if it calculate the % of dayligt in a room for living, if the room not have 10 % glass area pr m², it's a boring job to calculate it for proving that there is minimium 2 % dayligth in the room.

"
Hi Torfinnm, the main difference is that Pro Data will also let you record data, like, heating, lighting, wall types, more intricate area calculations.
"
BTW, this link to comparison between Standard and Pro version,    http://www.redstickcad.com/product.html

Torfinn