Magnetic North UTM Analysis?

Question

I am trying to figure out how to change an analysis to orient toward magnetic north. I need to generate several 5 x 5 km boxes in a local UTM projection but with the orientation at magnetic north (not true north and not just rotating the angle of declination in a layout view). This is for flight line planning and and when I generate a box in UTM and bring it into our flight planning software the box shifts from the magnetic north display (and the direction the plane flies) to the true north that the box was created in. This is causing additional flight lines to be generated as the box is just slightly skewed. How can I change this?

Please, any suggestions would be helpful!

Thanks,

Mel

NeilAyres · Answer

Just a comment here...

Surely the data frame (initially at least) will always be oriented and aligned to the grid ie the projection. Except at the central meridian, true north (the direction of the north pole) will be slightly offset from this. Mag north varies depending on where you are. Quite a tricky problem to align the flight lines to this. Why don't they use a GPS then fly along the grid. Most survey companies do this.

SepheFox · Answer

I suggest making your boxes using the Cartography toolset. The Make Grids and Graticules Layer tool could be used to make flight lines oriented correctly with your UTM grid, and the Strip Map Index Features tool could be used to make boxes oriented along the lines.

SepheFox · Answer

Can you use the rotate shapes tool in ET Geowizards to rotate your polygons according the magnetic north?