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Laser measurers
turmeric
Posts: 830
Hello all on this wet and windy day, I might need to start measuring gardens and I tried measuring my own with a long tape which was unwieldy and tricky in certain places. Just wondered if anyone had any experience with those laser measurers (they're not as expensive as I thought they might be). I wondered how you measure when shrubs or trees are in the way or how you measure the back wall of a house, so you have to use triangulation everytime? Any experience anyone?
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Laser measures need line of sight between the points being measures. Shrubs will stop the beam and you will get a measurement from the measure to the shrub, not from the measure to the back fence/wall.
Do you need to measure for legal reasons or garden reasons.? I know a man with a 3D laser scanner that can give you an accurate 3D model, but it's not cheap.
Last edited: 10 February 2018 18:29:57
Apart from obstacles in the line of sight, I found it's almost impossible to measure more than about 50-60ft in one go, even using a Leica @ over £200. But it's easily solved by bouncing the dot off of something handy like a brick that you can move down the garden in stages and adding the distances together.
They're invaluable if you have a lot of measuring to do
Billericay - Essex
Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit.
Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.
Brilliant idea Pete8. I need to get my head round this new concept. No, fidgetbones, not legal reasons more gardening help locally on a casual basis. I tried measuring my own garden with a tape measure and hadn't realised how tricky it was if you wanted to be accurate rather than my usual "well it's about 4 fence panels"
Saw the laser things online and they're not too expensive. But the brick idea is clever, I'll work on that.
Thanks all.
Just be very careful if you are going to have an assistant holding the brick. Even low power lasers can damage the eye very quickly if shone directly into it.
No assistant KT, just little ol' me moving the brick around. But I will be careful, thanks for the tip.
All good ideas chrissie, thank you. I was thinking of getting a variation of the brick idea by using something like the paddles people have at auctions so I could stick the spike in the ground and direct the laser beam onto the paddle (I can probably make one). If the lasers cost hundreds of pounds I'd be sticking with a 50m rule but at £20 they're worth considering as a backup for fiddly areas (I got a bit wedged behind my shed when I was using my tape measure
which was hysterical).
I use ours all the time for building surveys (it's known as the wizzy-wig. No idea why). It's easier in fading or low light as the red dot isn't very bright in strong sunlight. A piece of white cardboard on a stick makes a handy target. They are very easy to use.
“It's still magic even if you know how it's done.”
Thanks raisingirl. Any recommendations of which one to go for or did you get an expensive one?