+Hick@Heart Posted January 1, 2008 Share Posted January 1, 2008 Today I was in the Cleveland National Forrest and my compass screen was not working well while in "go to" mode. I was out in the open and the directional arrow was going everywhere. I could not get the thing to point in the right direction. It would show the cache to my left 40 feet away. I turn to the left and it would move and point to my right or behind me, I was walking in circles and the compass would not point forward. At one point, it said the cache was behind me yet the distance was going down as I kept walking forward. I finally calibrated the compass and it seemed to work much better. How often does this happen? Should I just calibrate the thing each time I go out? What screen do you use like to use to approach a cache? Quote Link to comment
+hogrod Posted January 1, 2008 Share Posted January 1, 2008 I finally calibrated the compass and it seemed to work much better. How often does this happen? Should I just calibrate the thing each time I go out? What screen do you use like to use to approach a cache? I calibrate the compass every time I start a hike. You may have noticed if you leave the electronic compass on in your car for example all the metal will make it not work properly, it also seems to mess with the calibration. one way around this is to turn it off when your not going to need it. To turn off the compass, hold down the quit/page key(upper right button). I use the compass screen when approaching a cache, just when I get within 200-100ft away I watch the distance to next more than the compass arrow. Quote Link to comment
+Hick@Heart Posted January 1, 2008 Author Share Posted January 1, 2008 I calibrate the compass every time I start a hike. You may have noticed if you leave the electronic compass on in your car for example all the metal will make it not work properly, it also seems to mess with the calibration. OK. so that begs the question, is calibrating the compass on the hood of my truck a bad idea? I figured since it was an electronic compass and not a magnetic compass, the metal would not affect it. I guess I could just calibrate it on the palm of my hand. (My skin hand, not the metal one ) Quote Link to comment
+hogrod Posted January 1, 2008 Share Posted January 1, 2008 OK. so that begs the question, is calibrating the compass on the hood of my truck a bad idea? I figured since it was an electronic compass and not a magnetic compass, the metal would not affect it. I guess I could just calibrate it on the palm of my hand. (My skin hand, not the metal one ) It is an electronic compass, but think of it more as an electronic magnetic compass. So yes you want to be away from any cars or electromagnetic fields(high wires) when you calibrate it. I just did a little test(indoors) I tried the compass on my vistaCX and it was working good, I then walked to the refrigerator and sure enough with the vistaCX very close to the fridge(with all that metal) the compass showing as much as 90degrees off. Quote Link to comment
gallet Posted January 1, 2008 Share Posted January 1, 2008 (edited) Question: Is calibrating a senstitve electronic instrument designed to pick up the weak magnetic field of the Earth not a good idea on a metal bonnet with sources of magnetism under the hood. Answer: Yes. Remember, any source of electricity in motion will generate an electric field. Like powerlines for example. Edited January 1, 2008 by gallet Quote Link to comment
+Indotguy Posted January 1, 2008 Share Posted January 1, 2008 My Lowrance GPSer has a "Steer Arrow" which can be added to the data fields of any of the customizable pages. Whether your on the map page or data page the steer arrow always points in the direction of the Go To. Quote Link to comment
Tonka_Boy Posted January 1, 2008 Share Posted January 1, 2008 hick@heart wrote... What screen do you use like to use to approach a cache? I use a Garmin 12map. (read antique?) I begin most searches with the goto arrow. At average walking speed, though, I out pace the distance reading. So at 100 feet from GZ I stop and wait for the distance to count down. It usually get down to about 40 feet with the arrow making corrections. Assuming decent coverage, it's pretty accurate at that point, and may be pointing exactly to the cache. The only bad thing about this approach, is when I start moving again, the arrow is pretty much worthless. If the cache is not quickly found, I switch to the Lat/Lon readings, and can usually get spot-on the cache. In the case of heavy tree coverage, or nearby hills, I may set the GPSr down or hang it from a branch while we search. This allows the unit to "zero in" on the coordinates. After a small adjustment to the position, we are usually successful. Not bragging, but the only DNFs that we post, already have several others posted. The only time that we really had trouble was here. Those hills blocked most of the signals and my GPSr actually became a liability. We did a lot of unnecessary walking that day! Quote Link to comment
+Hick@Heart Posted January 1, 2008 Author Share Posted January 1, 2008 Question: Is calibrating a senstitve electronic instrument designed to pick up the weak magnetic field of the Earth not a good idea on a metal bonnet with sources of magnetism under the hood. Answer: Yes. Remember, any source of electricity in motion will generate an electric field. Like powerlines for example. Good info, thanks. Does this mean I can put an asterisk next to my DNF yesterday? Too bad I already used my mulligan! Other than doing it on metal, is there anything else I should be careful of while calibrating the compass? Quote Link to comment
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