Good GPS for forest roads ?

[geo_tonz]

[jordauto]

For iphone maps in Canada, I use "Topographic Maps Canada". Its in the app store,free and uses the free government supplied topo maps. You download the maps for the area you will be in before you go on your wifi at home. The maps themselves are dated and do not provide a huge amount of detail, but it's a nice simple interface and it it will show your location,and allow you to drop flags. Flag positions are shown with lat/long as well. It works very well and will show main logging roads,lakes,rivers,and has a measure feature which allows you to measure the distance between two points on the map.

[dobryan]

[4x4BNB]

We use the earthmate inreach for iPhone n ipad. U can attach via blue tooth to ur gone or tablet. Then we use an app for iPhone/ipad called "you need a map". U can us the inreach maps too

[hans j]

Just checked on my Gaia on my android, Nunavut comes up in ERSI satellite imagery, NRCAN vector topo, Mapquest imagery and probably others

Comes up exactly what came up in google maps. Looks like it's right off a little tributary inside a bunch of islands somewhere way North! 17*N 70.29977, -83.10758 and about 2287 miles from my house in SLC!

Oh and it's only a $10 app in Android store...
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1986 Canadian Syncro Westy TDI - 1989 Syncro Single Cab - 2001 Audi S4 - 1981 VW Caddy ABA - 1980 VW Caddy EV - 1973 VW T-181

[geo_tonz]

[Xtremjeepn]

I lived off my motorcycle for 6 months last year and traveled 18,000 miles of backroads from border to border and coast to coast.

I carried with me a Garmin Montana 650t, GS3 Andoid phone and an iPad.

I'll cut to the chase! Buy an iPad Mini and buy any and every GPS app you want! It will work great in the van and do a thousand other things for you.

The software designed for the iPhone and iPad is much more refined than the stuff for Android. Nothing against Android, love them. It's just the the iOS standards are much higher and more developers develop for iOS first.

Now, lets talk about my $700 Garmin POS nav!

-bad display
-poor, out of date map data, and I have the latest.
-poor routing (always tells you where the nearest fuel is as the crow flys)
-archaic interface. Takes forever to use!



Then ONLY reasons I use the garmin on the bike:
-waterproof
-works with leather gloves on.
-direct sunlight readable display

I always ended up using the iPad to plan my routes and the Garmin to just plot the points...ON A MOTORCYCLE....if I had been in a van I wouldn't have bothered with the Garmin.

Garmin thought this was a state highway! (Seriously) BTW, these two images are about 1500 miles apart

[hans j]

I would have chosen an ipad tablet but the galaxy has expandable storage, one thing I wanted for use in the van.

Here is a track http://www.everytrail.com/view_trip.php?trip_id=2184695&code=f267b51d2d285d8eceddb79295e5e001 recorded on my way back from Syncro Solstice. Out in the middle of nowhere the tablet picks up GPS and can record it. You can download places you will be before hand on wifi if you want to see where you are while you are out there. Going to be the same on any device with Gaia. This track was recorded and then uploaded to gpsvisualizer.com (actually pretty cool!), google maps won't upload the full track for some reason.

But it's cool to see where you have been and if you download where you are going before hand, you can see where you are. It does take a while to save the maps beforehand, maybe I just haven't gotten used to it yet.

I looked into Garmin and others but the tablet is going to fit my needs for a multi purpose gadget in the van. I still keep a paper atlas and maps on the passenger seat when I drive around...
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1986 Canadian Syncro Westy TDI - 1989 Syncro Single Cab - 2001 Audi S4 - 1981 VW Caddy ABA - 1980 VW Caddy EV - 1973 VW T-181

[Royb]

Speaking of forests, how does an iphone or other phone gps do under forest cover? Garmins had a hard time picking up satellites until they added the sirf chip. This could be important if driving in extensive cover, although more important hiking.
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1991 Westy

[ragnarhairybreeks]

Hi,

I appreciate all the tips in this thread. I have an old, bog standard, bare bones but reliable Magellan GPS. No maps, just position, routes, waypoints, POI's etc. Works fine for marking places I want to return to.

Most of the camping I do is via logging roads here on Vancouver Island. I have maps, including some old Mac-Blo company logging road maps, but some of you know how many of the logging roads have been blocked, bridges removed, and roads over-grown.

One hack I use on occasion (and it is a bit of an awkward hack) is to max out the cache in google earth (4 Gigs?) on my laptop, then survey the area I am planning to travel around. I zoom in to all the spots I want to explore. Then I take the laptop with me on the trip. I can get lat and long from the old gps then enter the coords in google earth and get my location on the sat. image.

Works fine until you stray out of the area you have cached on the laptop

Of course as I'm doing that I'm wishing I had an iPad or other tablet mounted on dash giving me the fix quicker.

cheers

alistair
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'82 westy, diesel converted to gas in '94, now gone...
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Old address still works...
http://shufti.wordpress.com

[Steve Arndt]

If you go the ipad route, be aware the non 3G (wifi only) ipad doesn't include the GPS chip. It only has compass. Very annoying since I didn't know that before acquiring one.

Steve

[Jon_slider]

> One problem I forgot to mention with using the iPhone is that you cannot turn off the cell radio without turning off the GPS. This means if you are out of cell service or have crappy reception your phone will kill it's battery in a few hours desperately hunting for cell service while you use the GPS.

So True!
However, I use my iPhone with Navigon in a dock on my Syncro Dash, so its plugged in to power.

I ran a Nuvi side by side with my iPhone, and they both lost reception on the same parts of Highway 17, so I ditched the Nuvi, one less device to keep charged..

otoh, my iPhone loses reception in parts of Big Sur, where cvBills Nuvi does not lose reception. Its a close call, but the iPhone has less reception than a Nuvi, in parts of Big Sur.

Ive never tried Gaia, sounds powerful. Navigon does not do topography, although it seems to have every single road I could ever imagine. In fact, it has roads that don't even exist.

For example, I followed my iPhones instructions using Navigon in Death Valley, it got me stranded in a saline dust trap. It was using a no longer existent road to reach the Hot Springs, 2 miles before the road that actually works now.

Navigon has no track feature either, and it is not a hiking GPS by any stretch.

> Speaking of forests, how does an iphone or other phone gps do under forest cover? Garmins had a hard time picking up satellites until they added the sirf chip. This could be important if driving in extensive cover, although more important hiking.

I would say the iPhone GPS reception is close to slightly worse than a Garmin with SIRF. My gamins have all had SIRF. There are many terrain scenarios that electronic GPS fail to get signal, both iPhone and Garmin, deep canyons, tree cover, and surprisingly also on the South Coast Ridge road in Big Sur, which has a totally clear view of the sky. (Conspiracy theory, Fort Hunter Ligget maintains a GPS blackout zone to prevent aliens from landing)

otoh, where there IS GPS reception, my iPhone running Navigon works great!

Like others mention, I do spend a great deal of time preparing for a trip, using google maps, and paper maps, to locate, confirm, and save waypoints into my iPhone's Navigon app.

For example, next week when we go to Tahoe, I have pre saved routes with multiple waypoints so I can choose several different routes to our destination. You can see the google maps routes in the get together thread linked in my signature. I have Navigon routes saved to do those routes. I also carry paper maps marked with the same waypoints, and compass.
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My Soapboxes: Inflation; Handling; Gearing; Decoupling; Swepco

[T3 Pilot]

Checkout Fugawi iMap.
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1988 Vanagon

The most important part in every vehicle is the nut behind the wheel......

[Royb]

I asked the technology folks at the Forest Service and found out that they tested various GPS brands and an iPad and found that the iPad performs pretty comparably, including under forest cover!

http://www.fs.fed.us/database/gps/mtdcrept/accuracy/index.htm
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1991 Westy

[240Gordy]

Uh, i dont think the map/photo correspond to the coorinates . . .
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Tencentlife said,
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[240Gordy]

[geo_tonz]

[syncromike]

I mostly use AccuTerra on my iPhone in back country. It's pretty nice. I won't do turn-by-turn navigation, but I wouldn't trust using that from any app since you never know when a forest road will wash out or something.

AccuTerra does have:
-topo
-download maps ahead of time so you don't need cell signal
-accurate GPS
-clearly marked trailheads
-shows Jeep Trails as well as forest service roads
-shows land ownership so you can always make sure you're camping on BLM/Forest service land (this is huge for me)
-trip tracking, with location-tagged photos, and ability to share routes on the Web

http://mobile.accuterra.com/
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'91 Syncro w/ Country Homes PopTop

[dobryan]

[grnson]

What about Dual Sport Maps for android devices?https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.dualsportmaps.android I've used it on my motorcycle as well as in the syncro. Does the job and has the ability to download offline maps. I like the ability to upload tracks to the web and look at them on the computer rather than just on the phone or tablet. I think it has far more capability than I use it for but it serves the purpose. One device to keep up with rather than multiples is always a good thing.
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