Abstract: To get rid of the shortcoming of low coverage/reliability of both empirical algorithm and SHARP algorithm, the reference location nodes selected with the Maximum Coverage of the Layout Problem (MCLP) were investigated introducing the Greedy Random Adaptive Search Procedure (GRASP) into MCLP. Then, the Coverage based Reference node Selection (CRS) algorithm was proposed where a maximum triangular coverage should be laid out then spread over step by step so as to select the locations of reference nodes. The result of the simulation tested with Matlab showed that the CRS algorithm can make the coverage bigger at the cost of prolonging the time for layout without increasing extra overheads for hardware.