Co-ordinates

[missmod88]

this has probably been addressed before, but thought I would post it here for a quick reply

 

the first two numbers after the N and the degree number there are 2 numbers, followed by a decimial, and three other numbers,, what are they? exactly,, minutes and seconds? and are they all necessary for an exact location?

 

my brother has left me a geocache, and the numbers he gave me are kinda weird.. help!!

 

Sue

[+CompuCash]

there are several ways to express coordinates

and to keep it simple I won't go into the specialty notations

since you only asked about degrees and minutes.

 

degrees - minutes - seconds = dd mm ss

 

degrees - minutes - seconds and decimal seconds = dd mm ss.sss

 

degrees - minutes - decimal minutes = dd mm.mmm

 

degrees - decimal degrees dd.dddddd

 

geocachers use degrees - minutes - decimal minutes = dd mm.mmm

 

yes they are all necessary - that last m in .mmm represents about 6 feet.

as you move to the left you can multiply by 10, 600-60-6 feet

 

so if you left off that last decimal digit you could only get about 60 foot

resolution from your gps. no this all depends on a lot of other things

including the reported accuracy of your gps at the time you read it, as

it may be reporting a 25' error. (EPP= estimated position error)

 

and for the purists out there I am trying to keep it simple here - that 6 foot

notation is an approximation that depends on what latitude you are talking about.

 

cc\

[missmod88]

ok I just got off the phone with him, and his gps is set to the mm ss.sss one

and mine is the dd mm ss one

 

now his co-ordinates he gave me are:

49* 4707.3

94* 351.7

 

and I can't make heads or tails of that

 

help!

[Tahosa and Sons]

If you could post a link to the cache in question it sure would help us help you.

Lets look at the coordinates for your find

• Degrees° Decimal. Minutes' N49° 46.752' W094° 33.967'
  
• Degrees° Minutes' Seconds" N49° 46' 45" W94° 33' 58"
  
• Decimal Degrees° N49.77920³ W94.56612°
  

Even though the numbers are different the location is the same. Its all in the format you are using.

And the coords he gave you are even confusing to me.

now his co-ordinates he gave me are:

49* 4707.3

94* 351.7

Maybe 49° 47.073' 94° 35.170' is what he is trying to tell you. Which would put you on the West side of the lake NW of Kenora

[+AtoZ]

ok I just got off the phone with him, and his gps is set to the mm ss.sss one

and mine is the dd mm ss one

 

now his co-ordinates he gave me are:

49* 4707.3

94* 351.7

 

and I can't make heads or tails of that

 

help!

This is NOT valid as the most minutes you can have is 59.999 so he has made a mistake some place or he is giving you the coordinates in something other then lat/long. Ask what corridnate system he is using. It is NOT UTM either so maybe he just wrote it down wrong.

cheers

[+Markwell]

ok I just got off the phone with him, and his gps is set to the mm ss.sss one and mine is the dd mm ss one

 

now his co-ordinates he gave me are:

49* 4707.3

94* 351.7

 

I think therein lies the problem.

 

Most likely he just read it to you incorrectly. If he is set to minutes and decimal seconds, it's probably 49 degrees, 47 minutes, 7.3 seconds and 94 degrees, 35 minutes, 1.7 seconds

 

Call him back and have him verify his coordinate format, then have him read the coordinates back to you, and BE SURE TO INCLUDE ANY SPACES. That might be the telling factor in this predicament.

[+Hyack]

missmod88

 

You were FTF on my cache at the Dawson Portage but never logged it! Claim your glories!

 

http://www.geocaching.com/geocache/GC4MGWT_dawson-portage?guid=442bf563-5bab-4506-9b28-418f35ccbb61

 

Hyackman

[+The A-Team]

missmod88

 

You were FTF on my cache at the Dawson Portage but never logged it! Claim your glories!

 

http://www.geocaching.com/geocache/GC4MGWT_dawson-portage?guid=442bf563-5bab-4506-9b28-418f35ccbb61

 

Hyackman

Uhhhh, it might have been better to just contact them directly by email through their profile rather than resurrecting a 9 year old forum thread about a totally unrelated matter. They wrote in the log that they haven't cached in years, so it's unlikely that they're still monitoring the forums.