Quality of altimetric surveys in sugarcane agricultural lands performed with GNSS RTK receiver mounted on an all-terrain vehicle

Abstract

Altimetric data is in high demand for organizing activities in agricultural lands, mainly for planning conservation systems, planting lines, direction planning, and rural roads, especially with the growing number of areas using precision farming deployment. Therefore, the development of new data collecting technologies, such as positioning satellite systems with real-time, correction optimizes the survey; however, for large agricultural areas, manual data collecting is difficult and time consuming. One way to reduce the time needed to perform the altimetry survey is the use of kinematic methods for collecting altimetry data, with equipment mounted on vehicles. Thus, this study aimed to evaluate the quality of altimetric surveys with GNSS RTK receiver aboard an all-terrain vehicle. The data collecting was performed at three speeds, five survey directions, and three terrain slopes. All analyzed factors of variation obtained average vertical gap below 0.01 m, and a standard deviation below 0.10 m, with best results observed at 2.2 m s−1 speed, with vertical standard deviation of 0.03 m. Although all analyzed factors achieved satisfactory quality levels, in order to ensure the safety of the operator, the speed 3.89 m s−1 is recommended only in the direction parallel to the planting line, and the speed of 6.54 m s−1 is not recommended.