Are you curious about how much time (on average) you spend surveying for a project? Well then you’re not alone! Below is a fellow archaeologist who is looking to answer that and they’re asking for your input/help!

Edit – Updated instructions

Morpsend (aka Morpsen) has started a project to gather info, from Archaeologists like you, in order to find the average time it takes to solve an artifact. (Via MMO and Battlenet)

If we can get a group of people to time themselves solving projects we can average them out and give everyone a number to expect it will take per solve.

Instructions:

• Open the stop watch at the bottom of you minimap and start it once you start to dig.
• Dig until you have completed 10 artifacts.
• If you are not using a flying mount then please specify your riding skill.
• If you get a rare during those 10 solves please solve it, and start over.
• Make sure to stop and start your stop watch any time you are not 100% devoted to archeology. Such as: if you get a tell and hold a conversation mid digging then stop the time.
  (Conversations while in flight to next dig sites are fine) – Also if you afk at any point, stop the time.
• If you plan to use keystones during the process please add in your reply if you used them or not, and say how many stones you used.

We are looking to get usable avg time it takes to solve an artifact. Keystones will affect the numbers we get. It would be helpful if you do not use keystones.
The more people we get to participate the more accurate an avg number we will have.

We are discounting the time it takes to get a rare in the grand total due to the fact that it would skew the numbers if someone was solving a rare in the 10 solves. We are assuming the extra time to solve a rare is so very small when considering the total time as to discount it completely. Personally I’ve solved 2957 solves total, and only 30 rares. The extra time it took to make those rares wouldn’t come close to changing my average.

Example: I timed myself doing 100 solves which took 1182 minutes for an average time of 11.82 minutes per solve. I used zero keystones. I completed these 100 solves in Kalimdor in 4.0.6. I did not solve a rare during these 100 solves.

Thank you – Morpsend

If you are interested, more info can be found at the following Forum Posts:
http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/2522464295
http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/904699-Archeology-time-per-solve.