OT: Steel deck - seeking advice/idea

[boats]

Plain optical Transit and rod is the way I have always laid out a job. This after working one summer on a USCE Hydrographic Survey party 50 years ago. Makes me a 3 month expert. We set tide gauges and laid out dredging lines off USGS benchmarks.

Disadvantage to the level and rod it’s a two man job. Instrument man and rod man. That’s about the only disadvantage. Set the transit on a corner you can shoot the elevations and angles for all the post etc. level will do the elevation not the angles. Either one inexpensive rentals.

Boats

[Rex]

Update

The method I ended up with is "none of the above". I am building out from one corner, counting holes and using levels to keep everything in the same plane. I expect it will introduce some error over the 40-ft length. So far so good.