RangerRick

Make that StrongEngineering.com

quote:Originally posted by gebu: quote:Originally posted by RangerRick:I think a good lesson to learn from this is to always have a working GPSr and cell phone. I'm sure if he had these two items, this hiker would have been rescued much sooner and he would have suffered much less pain. Unlikely. Regarding the reports he didn´t get lost and knew where he was going so a GPS wouldn´t be of any use. Gebu, I didn't think he was lost, but if his gpsr worked and his phone worked, he would have been able to notify searchers of his location, maybe.

I think a good lesson to learn from this is to always have a working GPSr and cell phone. I'm sure if he had these two items, this hiker would have been rescued much sooner and he would have suffered much less pain.

Bhist, The solution to this problem was posted in these forums on Arpil 23, 2003. Look for a post authored by "The Mcflurrys". I think maybe you should edit your first post of this thread so you don't get sued for libel. Glad to see you have your problem solved. Now enjoy the sport.

Perfect summary Anders!

Lots of good information in this section even though tempers got a litte heated. Well the attitude adjuster just arrived. First of all I think you are all correct in what you say. Personally, for geocaching purposes, rarely will the time of day make a difference. I found well over a hundred caches and some were at 5 in the morning, some were in the afternoon and some were midnight caches. If I was concerned about finding the cache as easy as possible, then I certainly would not attempt a midnight cache. So being off 5 feet at 3 pm instead of of 1 foot at 10 am really doesn't matter to me. On the other hand, sometimes I use my GPS to locate property boundries. In that case, every inch or centimeter counts. After reading the second post in this thread, I think we should be more concerned about why that curb is moving. Believe it or not, I have a seven hundred foot long driveway and it moves one eighth of an inch to the west every year. Actually, it is because I live on the side of a hill. LOL Hope this lessens the tension here a litte. Anyway, thanks to all above for the info.

I have a Garmin V and hook it up the way you want to and it works but I'm just not sure about your unit. Anyway, I loaded the Mapsource program onto my laptop. Next I hook the cable from the gps unit to the serial (or com) port on my laptop. Then I start the mapsource program. On top of the screen, I open the GPS tab and click on "Start Tracking". At that point, I can travel with the gps on my dashboard and watch my movement on the computer screen. Hopefully someone with a unit like yours will let us know if your unit works the same way.

For geocaching, I don't think there is any better unit on the market right now. Let the autorouting lead you to the cache area, switch to "off road" and the V will bring you to the coordintates you entered into it.

Cwoper, I know what you are talking about. About 3 years ago, I slipped a disk in my back. I could not lie down, stand or sit without have a terrible pain in my back and right leg. Spent 2 months in bed and about 6 more months on crutches. Pain killers were a big part of my diet. It took a long time for the pain to be tolerable but I can at least go hiking now. Every once in a while, it flares up again and I have to take it easy for a week or so. Your doctor has ordered an mri to check out your spine. (possibly a bulging disk but if your lucky it is just a pulled muscle) I hope everything works out well for you.

Try gpsdiscount.com.....great company to do business with. They sell the 128 MB card for $155. vs $233. at the Garmin site. It is still the Garmin card but at least it is cheaper.

I live in Connecticut and I own a Garmin V that can use WAAS but I find it totally useless. It slows down the unit I don't find it to be any more accurate than using the V without WAAS enabled. Maybe this is just because of my location. My .02

I buy 22 cent alkaline batteries at Costco and they last about 15 to 20 hours. Make sure your backlighting is turned all the way down. Backlighting can drain batteries real fast. Also, by any chance, have you gotten your gps wet by using it in the rain or dropping it in water? If so, moisture may be shorting out the batteries. I would try some new alkalines first and see how long they last.

Spiker, If my life depended on GPS, I would pick the Garmin GPS V. It is small enough to carry easily, you can download detailed maps into it and it will give you turn by turn directions. Good Luck to you and thank your husband for us.

Seems like I have the most practical use for routes. In my swimming pool business, my employees are to go to a certain address and do a service call and then proceed to another. They may do 10 services calls in a day so I enter the route in my Garmin V's or Streetpilot III's before they leave the yard. The GPS unit will show them which job to go to next and also show them the shortest route. On my Steeetpilot III's, I could look at the info screen page and I can tell how long the truck sat in any given area and also the top speed that truck went during the day. I can also see the breadcrumb trail to see if the were sidetracked. I rarely use the info page but it is nice to have

quote:Originally posted by RobAGD: I get the cross hatched area not even back ground features. -Robert The only time I've seen cross hatched areas is when I am in an area that I didn't load the basemap for that area.

Hello Renyoldman, If you just want to make the cache more challenging, try some midnight caches. The darkness and limited sight distance can quickly change the cache rating from a 1/1 to a 4/4. Just make sure the cache location can be approached after sunset. In some instances, it would not be allowed.

Very well said Billybob. I have spent an hour driving to a cache area and another hour looking for a legal place to park. The parking coordinates would be very helpful on some caches.

President of an in ground swimming pool company in Connecticut,US. I am able to geocache for the five months I have off during the winter if it doesn't snow too much.

As pledged, sent my $10 by using Paypal. Congratulations Lysa and Hubby!

I used my Streetpilot III to find my first dozen caches. It does have "off road" capability but it is really too big, heavy, and battery hungry for geocaching. It is best suited for the dashboard in your car or truck but it will work in a pinch.

Paypal works for me.

I have two GPS v's and two streetpilot III's. Whenever I geocache sole, I take both units. As soon as I get out of the car, I mark the car's location on both units and then put one unit back into my backpack. (turned of of course) I figure if the unit I am walking with malfunctions, I could use the other unit to get back to the car. I have been out on cloudy days and I do night caches also and I have there have been times when I had no idea which way the car was after I found the cache. I use the Streetpilot III to get me to the closest parking area to the cache site. The large color screen and the vocal directions make it real easy to follow while driving.

Any mother with morals like Lysa's deserves a nice wedding gift. If someone in Lysa's area wants to purchase a GPSr for her, her son and her fiance, I would kick in $10. I would suggest an Etrex or a Geko, just to keep things simple for them to get started. Just let me know if someone goes through with this. RangerRick