Sector · Construction & Engineering
Drone surveys for construction and engineering
Design-ready topography before the programme slips, measured earthworks quantities every month, and a record of the site that settles arguments, without putting surveyors on live haul roads.
- Vertical accuracy
- ±20 mmRMSE on hard surfaces, checkpoint-verified
- Typical turnaround
- 5 working dayscapture to CAD-ready deliverables
- Deliverable formats
- DWG · LandXML · LASon your site grid or OSGB36 / ODN
Selected clients
01What we hear
The problems we’re asked to solve.
- 01
Design cannot start without the survey
The programme assumes the topo arrives in week two. A ground survey of a large greenfield site can take weeks to book and weeks to complete, and every day of delay pushes back design, pricing and the start on site.
- 02
Earthworks quantities you can defend
Cut and fill figures drive subcontractor payments, interim valuations and compensation events. When quantities are estimated from a handful of spot levels, disputes follow. You need a complete surface and a method both parties accept.
- 03
Keeping people off live haul roads
Every hour a surveyor spends walking a working earthworks site is an hour of interaction with dump trucks and excavators. Under CDM 2015 you are expected to design that risk out where you can.
- 04
Progress reporting that means something
Clients, funders and monitoring surveyors want evidence of progress. Phone photos and marked-up drawings do not show quantities, and they do not provide a dated, measurable record of what was built and when.
- 05
Long linear schemes
Highway improvements, rail-adjacent works, pipelines and cable routes stretch for kilometres across land you do not fully control. Walking the whole corridor is slow, and traffic management for survey crews is expensive.
02How we help
The right survey for each decision.
03Procurement & compliance
Easy to appoint. Easy to audit.
Working on your site: CDM, RAMS and access
We work as a contractor under your principal contractor's arrangements for CDM 2015. Before mobilising we issue site-specific RAMS, a flight plan showing take-off and landing areas and flight lines, and our emergency procedures. On the day, our crew attends your induction, agrees a controlled take-off area with the site manager and coordinates with plant movements through your usual briefing. If your site uses a permit system for drone flights, we work within it.
- Insurance: £10m public liability and £10m professional indemnity insurance, with certificates issued on request.
- Accreditations: Constructionline Gold, SSIP · Once For All Health & Safety.
- CAA Operational Authorisation (Specific category), which covers flying close to your operatives and plant under controlled conditions.
- Card, PPE and induction requirements confirmed at booking so the crew arrives compliant.
Specification and control
Tell us your tolerances before we quote. We will work to your own survey specification, or to a recognised one such as the RICS guidance on measured surveys of land, and tie into your site control or local grid. Every deliverable is checked against independent checkpoints and the residuals are reported, so your engineer can sign off the survey rather than take it on trust.
Commercial terms
We are used to working under client purchase orders and standard subcontract terms, and will review NEC or JCT-based subcontract terms on request. For monthly earthworks measurement we can agree a fixed schedule and fixed price per visit, so the survey cost is known when you build it into the preliminaries.
Procurement pack
Everything your approval process needs, in one issue.
- Constructionline Gold & SSIP health and safety certificates
- CAA Operational Authorisation & operator registration
- Insurance certificates (public liability, professional indemnity)
- Site-specific RAMS & flight risk assessment
- Pilot competency records
- Data protection & privacy statement
- Accuracy methodology & sample survey report
04Case studies
Example projects.
05FAQ
Common questions
On open, hard surfaces a properly controlled drone survey typically achieves around ±20 mm vertically, verified against checkpoints. A total station will still be more precise on individual points, which is why we often combine the two: the drone captures the whole surface and the ground crew picks up the detail that matters most, such as kerbs, thresholds and invert levels. The report tells you exactly what was achieved.
Yes. Standard deliverables include DWG and DXF, LandXML surfaces, point clouds in LAS or LAZ and GeoTIFF orthomosaics. We can work on OSGB36 / ODN, a local site grid or a scaled engineering grid, and match your layer naming and feature coding if you send us your template.
The flight plan is agreed with your site manager in advance. We use a controlled take-off area away from plant routes, brief the site at the morning meeting, and maintain radio contact with the site team. Our operational authorisation and RAMS set out the separation and procedures used around your operatives. If conditions change, the flight stops.
Yes, and they are well suited to it. Each survey produces a complete surface, which is compared with the original ground, the previous month or the design. Quantities are reported by area or activity with the method stated, so your QS and the subcontractor are working from the same numbers.
Photogrammetry only sees what the camera sees, so wooded areas need LiDAR, which records ground returns through gaps in the canopy. Neither method measures inside manholes or below ground. We will scope the aerial and ground elements honestly so there are no gaps in the survey.
Standard projects are usually flown within a week or two of instruction, subject to airspace permissions and weather. Urgent pre-construction surveys can often be brought forward. Our crews travel UK-wide, so the location of your site does not add weeks to the programme.
Yes, and for ongoing sites we recommend it. We observe your control stations, check them against each other, and use them to establish the aerial survey. If anything does not agree, we tell you before it affects your setting out.
Insights
Guides worth reading first
Other sectors
Who else we work with.
Start a project
Tell us the outcome. We’ll specify the survey.
- 01We aim to reply within one hourA drone surveyor, not a salesperson, reviews your brief and calls if anything needs clarifying.
- 02Fixed quote & method statementScope, accuracy specification, deliverables, programme and RAMS — in writing.
- 03Fly, process, deliverCapture on your programme, then CAD-ready data with a verified accuracy report.