Experience in the Use of Digital Levels and CREDO NIVELIR Software for Monitoring Engineering Structures

Purpose: To present the experience of working with digital levels at a construction site during long-term settlement monitoring settlement of both engineering structures under construction and in operation in conditions of tight time constraints, a significant amount of work, limited resources and adverse observation conditions with the simultaneous need to perform them with high accuracy. Methods: Theory of measurement errors, least squares method, parametric adjustment method. Results: It is shown that digital levels of various manufacturers, although they are used to solve various geodetic problems, and the work of many authors is devoted to the study of the influence of various factors on the accuracy of the result obtained by them, but in real production conditions a number of such factors cannot be excluded, which leads to a deterioration in the accuracy of the leveling results. Practical recommendations for mathematical processing of leveling networks built by digital levels in the CREDO NIVELIR software environment are developed, non-standard types of settlement marks are proposed with an indication of the methodology for performing observations when using them. Based on the known dependence of the tilt angle of the digital level on the ambient temperature, an original method for its determination is proposed, including situations when the obtained value exceeds its compensation limits by the level software. It is shown that the conclusions obtained on the basis of the experience of working with digital levels make it possible to increase the accuracy of such work, as well as reduce their labor intensity, when monitoring the settlement of engineering structures. Practical significance: The conclusions and results presented in the article have been obtained on the basis of long-term control of the settlement of both engineering structures under construction and in operation and can be implemented by engineering and geodetic construction support.