GPS - mapping roads

Author

mapping roads

2lm@comcast.net

2007-06-16, 10:33 am

My company has several Garmin GPS 72 units. We want to be able to
drive some very twisting roads and map track points automatically. I
am trying to figure out - quickly - if these units suit our needs.
The boss just gave me this assignment and I only have a couple of days
to reserch, so any assistance is welcome.
I have read that the unit stores 2048 track points, so on a winding
mountain road it seems these could be used up rapidly. One of the
posts here said that when you store the trackpoints the number is
reduced to 750 and this may not be granular enough.
I realize this is very vague. Anyone there have experience with track
points in places like the Rocky Mountains? how far can you dirve
before you are out of track points using auto? I have read it depends
on the turns in the road..... lets say from Kabul to Heret. - about
400 Km That would be a 2 day trip if all goes well and little of it
is a straight line. Opinions welcome as I know nothing about GPS and
wonder if the Garmin 72 is capable of doing the job of recording this
sort if thing. Complete accuracy is not needed but it would be nice
if we could upload it to our Geobasse and be within a reasonable
distance - meaning not kilometers off as the roads curve.
Thank you,
Linda

Wayne R.

2007-06-16, 3:33 pm

My understanding of the trackpoint reduction is that it's a smart
reduction - points that don't deviate seriously from the track are
first to go.

If someone is with these units who has a laptop, the tracks can be
pulled out periodically, then "reassembled" later, or not, just used
in groups on screen.

Waypoint+ should be a suitable freeware utility to get that job done:
http://www.tapr.org/~kh2z/Waypoint/

Lots of others too...

Lots of datalogging solutions too but don't know if your timeline or
location allows decent shipping.

On Sat, 16 Jun 2007 06:12:04 -0700, "2lm@comcast.net"
<2lm@comcast.net> wrote (with clarity & insight):

>My company has several Garmin GPS 72 units. We want to be able to
>drive some very twisting roads and map track points automatically. I
>am trying to figure out - quickly - if these units suit our needs.
>The boss just gave me this assignment and I only have a couple of days
>to reserch, so any assistance is welcome.
>I have read that the unit stores 2048 track points, so on a winding
>mountain road it seems these could be used up rapidly. One of the
>posts here said that when you store the trackpoints the number is
>reduced to 750 and this may not be granular enough.
>I realize this is very vague. Anyone there have experience with track
>points in places like the Rocky Mountains? how far can you dirve
>before you are out of track points using auto? I have read it depends
>on the turns in the road..... lets say from Kabul to Heret. - about
>400 Km That would be a 2 day trip if all goes well and little of it
>is a straight line. Opinions welcome as I know nothing about GPS and
>wonder if the Garmin 72 is capable of doing the job of recording this
>sort if thing. Complete accuracy is not needed but it would be nice
>if we could upload it to our Geobasse and be within a reasonable
>distance - meaning not kilometers off as the roads curve.
>Thank you,
>Linda

Burnie M

2007-06-16, 10:33 pm

On Sat, 16 Jun 2007 06:12:04 -0700, "2lm@comcast.net"
<2lm@comcast.net> wrote:

>My company has several Garmin GPS 72 units. We want to be able to
>drive some very twisting roads and map track points automatically. I
>am trying to figure out - quickly - if these units suit our needs.
>The boss just gave me this assignment and I only have a couple of days
>to reserch, so any assistance is welcome.
>I have read that the unit stores 2048 track points, so on a winding
>mountain road it seems these could be used up rapidly. One of the
>posts here said that when you store the trackpoints the number is
>reduced to 750 and this may not be granular enough.
>I realize this is very vague. Anyone there have experience with track
>points in places like the Rocky Mountains? how far can you dirve
>before you are out of track points using auto? I have read it depends
>on the turns in the road..... lets say from Kabul to Heret. - about
>400 Km That would be a 2 day trip if all goes well and little of it
>is a straight line. Opinions welcome as I know nothing about GPS and
>wonder if the Garmin 72 is capable of doing the job of recording this
>sort if thing. Complete accuracy is not needed but it would be nice
>if we could upload it to our Geobasse and be within a reasonable
>distance - meaning not kilometers off as the roads curve.
>Thank you,
>Linda

I believe the GPS 72 will reduce the tracklog points to 500 when you
save the tracklogs in the unit.

Get Garmins Trip & Waypoint Manager and save the active tracklog (2048
points) to a PC.
2048 should last 8-12 hours but as you say, lots of turns in the road
will consume more trackpoints.

A unit like the eTrex Legend Cx has the option to write a copy of the
active tracklog to microSD card effective giving you a huge distance
without the filtering that occurs with saving to the saved trtacklog
area (in the unit).

John Tyson

2007-06-16, 10:33 pm

> I believe the GPS 72 will reduce the tracklog points to 500 when you
> save the tracklogs in the unit.
>
> Get Garmins Trip & Waypoint Manager and save the active tracklog (2048
> points) to a PC.
> 2048 should last 8-12 hours but as you say, lots of turns in the road
> will consume more trackpoints.
>
> A unit like the eTrex Legend Cx has the option to write a copy of the
> active tracklog to microSD card effective giving you a huge distance
> without the filtering that occurs with saving to the saved trtacklog
> area (in the unit).
>
While you may be able to get the GPS 72 to do what you want, you will find
your people will be putting in a lot of time "managing" it along the way; I
would definitely recommend you invest in a couple of the Legend Cx's per the
previous response, or any one of the Garmin "x" models. That will allow you
to just turn the tracking on and "forget" it until you need to offload the
tracks; with a reasonably sized SD card (1/2MB, 1 GB or 2 GB) the GPS can
store tracks all day, indefinitely, even if you are logging at the maximum 1
sec rate.

Since you mention pretty rugged and mountainous country, if your budget
allows I would recommend going to the "top of the line" (the 60Cx or 76Cx)
which will give you a more sensitive reciever (Garmin has announced a Legend
HCx which looks like it might be just what you want, but it isn't available
yet; the other Garmin "x" models have been out for a year or more, so are
relatively "mature" in terms of firmware.

John

2lm@comcast.net

2007-06-16, 10:33 pm

On Jun 17, 4:06 am, "John Tyson" <johnaty...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
>
>
> While you may be able to get the GPS 72 to do what you want, you will find
> your people will be putting in a lot of time "managing" it along the way; I
> would definitely recommend you invest in a couple of the Legend Cx's per the
> previous response, or any one of the Garmin "x" models. That will allow you
> to just turn the tracking on and "forget" it until you need to offload the
> tracks; with a reasonably sized SD card (1/2MB, 1 GB or 2 GB) the GPS can
> store tracks all day, indefinitely, even if you are logging at the maximum 1
> sec rate.
>
> Since you mention pretty rugged and mountainous country, if your budget
> allows I would recommend going to the "top of the line" (the 60Cx or 76Cx)
> which will give you a more sensitive reciever (Garmin has announced a Legend
> HCx which looks like it might be just what you want, but it isn't available
> yet; the other Garmin "x" models have been out for a year or more, so are
> relatively "mature" in terms of firmware.
>
> John

Thankyou - this is exactly the type of information I needed for the
boss.
I will recommend that we purchase 2 new units - as we will be driving
from Kabul to Herat and Kandahar and all over Afghanistan - we need to
make it as much "set and forget" as possible because you only want to
make some of these trips once jsut now. The language barrier will
make the units we have hard to expalin and I am sure data will get
lost or mangled.
Linda

stolarskin

2007-06-21, 10:33 pm

Might want to look into
some bulletproof vests
for yourself and secure
cases or something for the
gps units.
Would hate to get lost out there
if the gps isn't available.

<2lm@comcast.net> wrote in message
news:1182047068.059076.118290@i38g2000prf.googlegroups.com...
> On Jun 17, 4:06 am, "John Tyson" <johnaty...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
> Thankyou - this is exactly the type of information I needed for the
> boss.
> I will recommend that we purchase 2 new units - as we will be driving
> from Kabul to Herat and Kandahar and all over Afghanistan - we need to
> make it as much "set and forget" as possible because you only want to
> make some of these trips once jsut now. The language barrier will
> make the units we have hard to expalin and I am sure data will get
> lost or mangled.
> Linda
>

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