Newer formulas for the ellipsoid

Newer formulas for the ellipsoid

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In Survey Review in 1989 (p374), Bowring gave formulas for the Transverse Mercator that are simpler to program but retain millimeter accuracy. First, the conversion from latitude-longitude to Transverse Mercator coordinates:

  = radius of the equator of the chosen spheroid
  = polar semi-axis of the spheroid
  = scale factor along the central meridian
    =  latitude
   =  difference in longitude from the central meridian, in radians, positive eastward
   =   meridian distance on the spheroid from the equator to   (see below)

 

 

 

where   is the reciprocal of the flattening for the chosen spheroid (for WGS84, r = 298.257223563 exactly).

  (prime vertical radius of curvature)

 

 


 



 


To convert Transverse Mercator Easting and Northing to lat-lon, first calculate  , the footprint latitude-- i.e. the latitude that has a meridian distance on the spheroid of Northing/ . Bowring's formulas below seem quickest, but the Redfearn formulas above will suffice. Then

 

 

 

 

 

 


 


 


Meridian distance

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Bowring gave formulas for meridian distance (in Bulletin Geodesique, 1983) that seem to be correct within 0.001 millimeter on earth-size spheroids. The symbol   is the same as in the Redfearn formulas

 


 

 

 

   where  

Discard the real part of the complex number Z; subtract the real coefficient of the imaginary part of Z from   (in radians) to get  . Then

meridian distance  =   


(Note that if latitude is 90 degrees, then   , which, it turns out, gives the length of a meridian quadrant to a trillionth of a meter on GRS80.)

For the inverse (given meridian distance, calculate latitude), calculate   using the last formula above, then


 

 

 

Discard the real part of Z' and add the real coefficient of i to   to get the reduced latitude   (in radians) which converts to latitude   using the equation at the top of this section.

References

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