vista hcx calibration question

[+becausetheyaredead]

i thought i had successfully calibrated my garmin vista hcx because i haven't had much trouble finding caches but after placing my first three hides i was getting a lot of complaints of the coordinates and calibrated it using barometric altimeter instead of the fixed one. i went back to the gz's and saw what they were talking about.

 

i think everything is kosher now. any other suggestions?

 

also, how come i didn't have problems finding caches? the gz's i went to seemed withing 5' to me.

 

thanks in advance,

 

btad

[gratefulHIKE]

everyone uses different gps's to hide the caches........each gps is unique even those from the same company, the accuracies are relatively close but they do vary

 

and the fixed altimeter is a onetime reading for most, I think if there isnt a storm brewing and if you set the altitude and the pressure reads correctly there is no problem using it, I favor the barometric readings actually they are quite useful

[+Prime Suspect]

i thought i had successfully calibrated my garmin vista hcx because i haven't had much trouble finding caches but after placing my first three hides i was getting a lot of complaints of the coordinates and calibrated it using barometric altimeter instead of the fixed one. i went back to the gz's and saw what they were talking about.

 

i think everything is kosher now. any other suggestions?

 

also, how come i didn't have problems finding caches? the gz's i went to seemed withing 5' to me.

 

thanks in advance,

 

btad

This makes no sense. Your coordinates have nothing to do with the altimeter. Calibrating the altimeter won't have any effect on the satellite signals your getting (and the calibration is good for about 24 hours, max). It's the equivalent of setting your watch to the correct time by tying your shoe.

 

The reason your coordinates were bad was probably because you didn't take enough time. Leave the GPS there for a few minutes, and let the readings settle down.

[Alphawolf]

"Calibrating" A GPS receiver is an often misunderstood and erroneous myth. Don't feel bad though, in selling these things for 8 years, it is a very, very commonly asked question.

Remember, you can have 3 completely different systems working inside that little baby. You have a GPS receiver, a compass and an altimeter. You calibrate the altimeter (and trust me, this is a very, very, temporary calibration) and the compass, but there is just no possible way to "calibrate" the GPS receiver.

Nothing about the altimeter or the compass calibration affects the GPS accuracy in any way.

[+coggins]

"Calibrating" A GPS receiver is an often misunderstood and erroneous myth. Don't feel bad though, in selling these things for 8 years, it is a very, very commonly asked question.

Remember, you can have 3 completely different systems working inside that little baby. You have a GPS receiver, a compass and an altimeter. You calibrate the altimeter (and trust me, this is a very, very, temporary calibration) and the compass, but there is just no possible way to "calibrate" the GPS receiver.

Nothing about the altimeter or the compass calibration affects the GPS accuracy in any way.

Good post, direct and to the point!

[+becausetheyaredead]

"Calibrating" A GPS receiver is an often misunderstood and erroneous myth. Don't feel bad though, in selling these things for 8 years, it is a very, very commonly asked question.

Remember, you can have 3 completely different systems working inside that little baby. You have a GPS receiver, a compass and an altimeter. You calibrate the altimeter (and trust me, this is a very, very, temporary calibration) and the compass, but there is just no possible way to "calibrate" the GPS receiver.

Nothing about the altimeter or the compass calibration affects the GPS accuracy in any way.

Good post, direct and to the point!

 

thanks everybody for your clarifications. I did leave my gps at each gz for about 3 minutes and averaged the readings. i guess i'm still confused why it would be so far off (especially since the ones complaining have over 1000 finds)

 

thanks in advance,

 

btad

[+Miragee]

Usually, I get good coordinates with my Vista HCx by leaving it in place and having it average, although I often leave it for more than three minutes. If there are trees overhead, or if I am in a canyon, I might walk a couple hundred feet away, then have the GPSr bring me back to GZ. If it is off, I'll take new coordinates. Doing this a few times might give me numbers that are off a little. I can average those later when I am filling out the new cache form.

 

Interestingly, I looked for some caches, placed by one cacher, that were consistently off by 18 feet in a NNE direction. I figured they owned a different brand GPSr, but they didn't. The satellites must have been in different positions the day the caches were hidden. There are a couple of other cachers here whose coordinates are always perfect, according to my GPSr. My GPSr will read '0' and there is the cache.