EDUCATIONAL
FIELD REALITY CHECK
Total Station Pros and Cons: What Nobody Tells You in Class
It's the most trusted instrument on most survey crews. It's also expensive, blind without a clear sight line, and useless as a backup record of your own field notes.
Every instrument is a trade-off. Buy a total station and you're buying speed, accuracy, and automation, but you're also buying a price tag, a training curve, and a few blind spots that only show up once you're standing in a field with it. Let's weigh both sides honestly, the way a surveyor actually would before signing a purchase order.
