A Practical RTK Quality Checklist
This companion has covered a long list of things that can quietly undermine a coordinate, one chapter at a time. Brought together, they form a short, practical sequence worth running through on any point where the answer to would I trust this actually matters.
None of the individual checks in this chapter are new. What matters is running through them together, deliberately, on the points where getting it wrong would actually cost something.
Before Collecting Anything
Confirm the reference frame, epoch, and datum the project is standardized on, and verify the correction source in use actually matches that standard. Confirm the correct antenna model is selected in the field software, and confirm which measurement method the crew intends to use for antenna height before the first point is ever logged.
At Each Setup
Verify the rover pole is plumb at the moment of collection, not simply before it. Confirm satellite geometry looks reasonable, watching PDOP rather than satellite count alone. Note the approximate baseline to the base or the correction network's nearest reference infrastructure, and be aware of current atmospheric or geomagnetic conditions if the day seems to be behaving unusually.
For Each Point That Matters
Confirm the point was actually collected under FIX, not FLOAT, at the moment of logging. Watch for the specific signature of a false fix, a small, stubborn offset that resolves cleanly after a fresh initialization, especially in multipath-prone surroundings. Save the metadata this companion's previous chapter described, since it costs almost nothing now and may be the only thing that explains a discrepancy later.
For Anything Critical
A reoccupation only means something if the receiver actually lost its fix and resolved a fresh solution in between, an antenna dump or equivalent forced reinitialization, rather than continuing to report the same locked ambiguity solution it started with. For control points, legal boundaries, or high-value features, extend that same logic further: log the point again hours later or on another day, and perform a genuine independent check, a different base, a different correction source, or an entirely different measurement method, before treating a critical point as fully trusted.
A practical RTK quality habit is not a long list memorized from scratch each time. It is running through a short, familiar sequence, before, during, and after collection, and reserving genuine independent verification for the points where being wrong would actually matter.
One short chapter remains, to bring this companion's central lesson to a close.