Comparison of reliability and geometrical strength criteria in geodetic networks

Abstract.

 The proper and optimal design and subsequent assessment of geodetic networks is an integral part of most surveying engineering projects. Optimization and design are carried out before the measurements are actually made. A geodetic network is designed and optimized in terms of high reliability and the results are compared with those obtained by the robustness analysis technique. The purpose of an optimal design is to solve for both the network configuration (first-order design) and observations accuracy (second-order design) in order to meet the desired criteria. For this purpose, an analytical method is presented for performing the first-order design, second-order design, and/or the combined design. In order to evaluate the geometrical strength of a geodetic network, the results of robustness analysis are displayed in terms of robustness in rotation, robustness in shear, and robustness in scale. Results showed that the robustness parameters were affected by redundancy numbers. The largest robustness parameters were due to the observations with minimum redundancy numbers.