Levelling

Levelling (British English) or leveling (American English); is a branch of surveying, the object of which is to establish or verify or measure the height of specified points relative to a datum. It is widely used in cartography to measure geodetic height, and in construction to measure height differences of construction artifacts. Levelling (British English) or leveling (American English); is a branch of surveying, the object of which is to establish or verify or measure the height of specified points relative to a datum. It is widely used in cartography to measure geodetic height, and in construction to measure height differences of construction artifacts. Optical levelling employs an optical level, which consists of a precision telescope with crosshairs and Stadia marks. The cross hairs are used to establish the level point on the target, and the stadia allow range-finding; stadia are usually at ratios of 100:1, in which case one metre between the stadia marks on the levelling staff represents 100 metres from the target. The complete unit is normally mounted on a tripod, and the telescope can freely rotate 360° in a horizontal plane. The surveyor adjusts the instrument's level by coarse adjustment of the tripod legs and fine adjustment using three precision levelling screws on the instrument to make the rotational plane horizontal. The surveyor does this with the use of a bull's eye level built into the instrument mount.The surveyor looks through the eyepiece of telescope while an assistant holds a vertical level staff which is a graduated in inches or centimeters. The level staff is placed with its foot on the point for which the level measurement is required. The telescope is rotated and focused until the level staff is plainly visible in the crosshairs. In the case of a high accuracy manual level, the fine level adjustment is made by an altitude screw, using a high accuracy bubble level fixed to the telescope. This can be viewed by a mirror whilst adjusting or the ends of the bubble can be displayed within the telescope, which also allows assurance of the accurate level of the telescope whilst the sight is being taken. However, in the case of an automatic level, altitude adjustment is done automatically by a suspended prism due to gravity, as long as the coarse levelling is accurate within certain limits. When level, the staff graduation reading at the crosshairs is recorded, and an identifying mark or marker placed where the level staff rested on the object or position being surveyed.