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How important is a compass and altimeter in geocaching?


ehuesman

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Still trying to decide on gear and would like to hear how often everyone uses these features while caching.

 

Note to Moderator: I know this is a gear question, but my concern is specific to caching. I've been getting better feedback in this forum and I promise not to duplicate it in the other one. Sorry about last time :D

Edited by ehuesman
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Having the compass on your GPSr keeps the arrow pointing in the direction of the cache, even when you are not moving. If you get a GPSr like the Venture Cx, the arrow will spin around when you stop or slow down.

 

However, that is a minor consideration. The accuracy for finding the cache will be the same, and if you do a lot of hiking, you should have a regular magentic compass with you.

 

I usually have the Compass turned off on my Vista C . . .

 

The barometric altimeter is just for fun. For the average cacher, I don't think it is necessary.

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I agree with him 100%. I have a vista cx and use the compass sometimes. It is nice for when you are moving slow, but not necessary. A normal compass will do, just need to learn to read bearings. Altimeter is just a gimmick geocaching. It can be fun to see how far you climbed up/down along a hike but won't help you find it persay.

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Neither the electronic compass or altimeter is important to me. As you walk to the cache location, the arrow will point in the direction that you need it to. If you are standing still and want to know which direction something is in, you can either start walking and look at the arrow or check your regular compass.

 

The altimeter is useless to me.

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The Venture Cx compass DOES NOT "spin around" when you stop. It does however not turn with you if you stand still and turn in a new direction. Take a few steps and it points in the right direction again.

 

You do not "need" either for geocaching. Just extra bells and whistles. Addthat to a GPS unit will add $50 - $75 to the price. You can pick up a decent compass at Walmart for about $10.

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The Venture Cx compass DOES NOT "spin around" when you stop. It does however not turn with you if you stand still and turn in a new direction. Take a few steps and it points in the right direction again.

 

You do not "need" either for geocaching. Just extra bells and whistles. Addthat to a GPS unit will add $50 - $75 to the price. You can pick up a decent compass at Walmart for about $10.

 

The other day, I went caching by myself. Riding shotgun with me was my pack that contained, my cell phone, my PDA, my GPSr, a compass, my MP3 player, and my digital camera. I thinking to myself.. I've become Inspector Gadget. I cannot wait for the day when all this is in one device. I went with the CSX because I wanted to eliminate a device but all I needed to have happen was to have my batteries quit once when I needed a compass to put the trusty old standard compass back in the pack. Sigh.

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I've used the compass on my NON Electronic compass GPS exactly once to solve a puzzle cache. I would have been better off with a hand held compass. I would not have been better off with an electronic compass.

 

Never have cared about my elevation except out of curiosity.

 

They are not important, but some people find them nice in that an electronic compass makes the GPS point the right direction (more or less) when you are standing still. I found it more of a PITA when I had the use of one of these kind of GPSs and turned it off.

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I guess I'll add a slightly dissenting opinion. I agree that other than a curuoisity the altimiter is of no value. The compass I've found very useful probably because it keeps me from having to pay attention when I'm stopped and turn slightly. The arrow stays pointing the correct direction. As others have said you can certainly use a standard compass for this but it's handier for me personally to have it included. When you look at the cost of the unit the add isn't that much or at least it wasn't for me. Others certainly have other opinions.

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one note i think is important....

 

my gps has elec. compass and altimeter. they are cool, and i have played with them on occasion...usually the compass is off, and the altimeter is wrong, go fiugre. but, when you replace the batteries, you have to recalibrate both of them. i have experiemented with the compass to see if calibration is necessary, and i didn't find that much difference between calibrated and non-cal. but that is something to keep in mind.

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My SUUNTO magnetic compass quite possibly saved my life on November 9, 2006. I waypointed my parking spot at 8:30AM, beat my way down to the south side of the Rogue river, found "Just Clowning Around" at 2:20PM and got back to my truck at 9:30PM. Except for the open sky area near the river and the road where I parked, I could not get more than 3 sats. It took me 7 hours to go less than 2 miles ATCF with a 1700 foot elevation gain. Remembering to bring my good light and my compass meant getting back to my truck and dry clothes before midnight. I called my wife on the cell phone at 2:30AM about 35 miles from where my 13 hour caching adventure began. The cache I went to is about 5 miles downstream from where Mr. Kim died three weeks later.

A compass can save your life or save a lot of embarrassment if your GPSr doesn't work for whatever reason.

Stay safe if you are going into a canyon (or between skyscrapers) where your GPSr probably won't work.

Tom Fuller

Crescent, OR

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one note i think is important....

 

my gps has elec. compass and altimeter. they are cool, and i have played with them on occasion...usually the compass is off, and the altimeter is wrong, go fiugre. but, when you replace the batteries, you have to recalibrate both of them. i have experiemented with the compass to see if calibration is necessary, and i didn't find that much difference between calibrated and non-cal. but that is something to keep in mind.

I have to disagree with you on the calibration. I have a 60CS and if the compass is not calibrated, it always points ~30-50 degrees either way of where I'm actually pointed. and is right on after calibration. I'm going by where the roads and streams are on my maps as compared to where it's pointing.

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yeah, that's quite possible. i haven't played too much, cause honestly i don't think they are necessary. i always carry my regular compass, so don't really need the fancy elec. one. so i guess to answer the op's questions, no they are not necessary for geocaching (imho) and prolly aren't that accurate unless correctly callibrated. and if you haven't callibrated an elec compass, do it at home. cause people will laugh silly if they see you turning in circles in a field!!!! :D

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My SUUNTO magnetic compass quite possibly saved my life on November 9, 2006. I waypointed my parking spot at 8:30AM, beat my way down to the south side of the Rogue river, found "Just Clowning Around" at 2:20PM and got back to my truck at 9:30PM. Except for the open sky area near the river and the road where I parked, I could not get more than 3 sats. It took me 7 hours to go less than 2 miles ATCF with a 1700 foot elevation gain. Remembering to bring my good light and my compass meant getting back to my truck and dry clothes before midnight. I called my wife on the cell phone at 2:30AM about 35 miles from where my 13 hour caching adventure began. The cache I went to is about 5 miles downstream from where Mr. Kim died three weeks later.

A compass can save your life or save a lot of embarrassment if your GPSr doesn't work for whatever reason.

Stay safe if you are going into a canyon (or between skyscrapers) where your GPSr probably won't work.

Tom Fuller

Crescent, OR

That's a happy ending story, Glad you you made it back and was able to read your compass. It's stories like this that make me wish I hadn't been sleeping thru the compass part when I was in Boy Scouts. I use the compass on mu GPSr to guide me to the cache, but honestly have no clue on how to use a compass on it's own and can't understand how a stand alone compass can help achieve that goal. Does anyone know of a course I can take on-line, or information that can provide me with enough training so I can use a real compass? It's geocacheing that has me wanting this and could just possible save me too. I get in the mountains quite a bit, always mark my truck before I head out. So far no problems, but I can see where I could easily get lost if I got turned around and lost Sat's. Appreciate any advice.

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I've used the compass on my NON Electronic compass GPS exactly once to solve a puzzle cache. I would have been better off with a hand held compass. I would not have been better off with an electronic compass.

 

Never have cared about my elevation except out of curiosity.

 

They are not important, but some people find them nice in that an electronic compass makes the GPS point the right direction (more or less) when you are standing still. I found it more of a PITA when I had the use of one of these kind of GPSs and turned it off.

 

I have a Garmin with sensors (electronic compass and altimeter) but have never found a time when either of them were needed or worthwhile. Done quite a few projection and other puzzle type caches and have never had any problems at all going the right direction while watching my heading while moving.

 

As far as the electronic compass arrow staying pointed towards the cache while not moving, i sure didn't know that! Of course i can't see that it would make a difference in finding a cache anyways.

 

My opinion is not to waste the extra moola for a model with sensors. :D

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The only time I've used a compass caching is in heavy tree cover with poor coverage. I find my etrex gets the best fix and distance/direction to the cache while standing still, but then I need a compass to tell which direction to go since my GPS needs to be in motion to give me compass info. Once I start moving in poor coverage the GPS often doesn't update fast enough. If you are going off the beaten track, a basic, no battery required compass is always a good idea.

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I find that the electronic compass need to be recalibrated too often to be reliable - I use a magnetic compass when I want to shoot a bearing.

 

The altimeter may be useful if you are in steep country - along with decent topo maps - but again, only if it is calibrated.

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as a follow up note to all this, i would reiterate what folks have already said....bring a regular compass with you if you are ever going after a backcountry cache. and it would be advisable to learn how to use one if you don't already know how. and if you don't know how to use one, try buyin a boy scout handbook. they are loaded with all kinds of really good info...and not just for the boy scouts either. anyone who camps or spends time outdoors should have their own copy. i highly suggest it.

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I like having the electronic compass but did without one for two years and did fine. I just had to walk 10-15 feet everytime I wanted the arrow to point at the cache again. This got a little annoying when I had to do this several times and my buddy with the 60CS did't have to. I never use the altimeter.

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Thanks again for everyone's input. I'll probably go without the sensors since I already have a compass and can probably remember how to use it again pretty quickly. I seem to remember words like azimuth, triangulation, ... now if I can only remember what they meant, lol.

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I have a vista C and use the electronic compass quite a bit. But I've noticed it will actually lead you slightly off of the most direct route to the cache if you don't calibrate it often. While moving to the cache having the electronic compass turned off seems to be more accurate. When I get to ground zero, if a more thorough search is required, I turn on the compass, calibrate it and then search some more.

Before I acquired the vista C, I had a cheap compass tied into the lanyard of my etrex. With the GPS on the compass page, turn the GPS to have North/South correspond to the real compass and then follow the seeker arrow. :huh:

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Does anyone know of a course I can take on-line, or information that can provide me with enough training so I can use a real compass?

 

I did a Google search for "how to use a compass" the other day and came up with several nice tutorials.

Google and search are my best friends! Thanks RedZeppelin. I found a short but informative piece on how to use a compass. Sad that I waited this long to learn, but never to late. Thanks for guiding me in the right direction.

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I have a Vista, which I bought for Powered Paragliding, so the altimeter and compass were needed.

 

I can't do that anymore, I still use the Vista, but since, everything within a 100 miles of me, is sea level, the altimeter is not a whole lot of use to me.

 

The compass saved me one day, when I got lost in the woods. I now carry and extra compass just to make sure.

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My SUUNTO magnetic compass quite possibly saved my life on November 9, 2006. I waypointed my parking spot at 8:30AM, beat my way down to the south side of the Rogue river, found "Just Clowning Around" at 2:20PM and got back to my truck at 9:30PM. Except for the open sky area near the river and the road where I parked, I could not get more than 3 sats. It took me 7 hours to go less than 2 miles ATCF with a 1700 foot elevation gain. Remembering to bring my good light and my compass meant getting back to my truck and dry clothes before midnight. I called my wife on the cell phone at 2:30AM about 35 miles from where my 13 hour caching adventure began. The cache I went to is about 5 miles downstream from where Mr. Kim died three weeks later.

A compass can save your life or save a lot of embarrassment if your GPSr doesn't work for whatever reason.

Stay safe if you are going into a canyon (or between skyscrapers) where your GPSr probably won't work.

Tom Fuller

Crescent, OR

That's a happy ending story, Glad you you made it back and was able to read your compass. It's stories like this that make me wish I hadn't been sleeping thru the compass part when I was in Boy Scouts. I use the compass on mu GPSr to guide me to the cache, but honestly have no clue on how to use a compass on it's own and can't understand how a stand alone compass can help achieve that goal. Does anyone know of a course I can take on-line, or information that can provide me with enough training so I can use a real compass? It's geocacheing that has me wanting this and could just possible save me too. I get in the mountains quite a bit, always mark my truck before I head out. So far no problems, but I can see where I could easily get lost if I got turned around and lost Sat's. Appreciate any advice.

Try finding a local orienteering club (like geocaching but using only a map and compass), some of thier web sites have basic compass and map reading instructions.

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That's a happy ending story, Glad you you made it back and was able to read your compass. It's stories like this that make me wish I hadn't been sleeping thru the compass part when I was in Boy Scouts. I use the compass on mu GPSr to guide me to the cache, but honestly have no clue on how to use a compass on it's own and can't understand how a stand alone compass can help achieve that goal. Does anyone know of a course I can take on-line, or information that can provide me with enough training so I can use a real compass? It's geocacheing that has me wanting this and could just possible save me too. I get in the mountains quite a bit, always mark my truck before I head out. So far no problems, but I can see where I could easily get lost if I got turned around and lost Sat's. Appreciate any advice.

 

You're in luck... check my web site http://www.scoutorienteering.com for a refresher course in the BSA merit badge. It is important however to realize that a compass without a map or a general understanding of the area you are in may be nearly useless. Learn to use the map and compass together and you don't need the GPS.

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You're in luck... check my web site http://www.scoutorienteering.com for a refresher course in the BSA merit badge. It is important however to realize that a compass without a map or a general understanding of the area you are in may be nearly useless. Learn to use the map and compass together and you don't need the GPS.

 

I'm definately going to have to look at the weblink, for I'm doing some Map & Compass stuff for a fellow cachers Scout troop.

 

I seldom use the compass on the GPS, and the altimeter is just a toy. Since I spend more time hiding them I'll use the WP Projection option to set up a multi route and then go from there.

 

But a lot of my caches are set up with some kind of compass work in them.

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