GPS for the car.....can I do this?

[+ksghost]

My GPS for my car died and I'm looking for a replacement. I don't know if this is possible - but this is a feature I would like. I use my (now dead) GPS for driving directions to get me in the general area of a cache and then use my handheld or phone for the actual find. This is what I would like.... When I have a planned caching trip I have been downloading cache locations to the cars GPS SD card to get me in the area which works fine. Many times when I have spontaneous hunts, I don't have the time or equipment to load the SD card and hand entering coordinates takes way to long. Is there a way to transfer coordinates from my phone via bluetooth or other method to the car's GPS? I know I could use the phone's driving direction feature but that uses way too much data and my plan limits how much data I can use. Any suggestions?

[+kunarion]

For an Android phone, an "OTG" USB memory card reader might be the simplest solution. The phone will need a file manager App that can interact with the connected card, and you'll have to move files with the App (which can be kind of a pain). If the phone already has an SD card slot of the same type as the car GPSr, you don't even need the OTG adapter.

 

Here are several such SD card readers (just an example): http://www.ebay.com/sch/Cell-Phone-Memory-Card-Readers-and-Adapters/48571/bn_317692/i.html

Heh, I see one is 87 cents with free shipping. I hope you get a better deal than that.

 

A fancier plan would be to get a portable wifi router that has an SD card port. That's what you'd probably need for an iPhone. It also uses less phone battery power than USB OTG hardware will. AND it will work if you get a new phone or a new GPSr -- say, one that has no SD card slot, if the router has a USB port.

 

Before I go on a drive, I select one cache in the place to where I'm heading, and load it onto the Nuvi from the PC -- or if I didn't plan ahead, I just type the coords manually and save the location. I have an OTG adapter and a wifi router, but it's a whole lot less trouble to load in advance or type the coords. And a little faster.

Edited October 15, 2015 by kunarion

[+Red90]

With the bluetooth Nuvi's you can transfer waypoints/favorites to the GPS with Garmin's smartlink app. There is no way to link this from Geocache pages or geocache apps that I know of. Maybe there is a way, but I have not seen it.

[+kunarion]

With the bluetooth Nuvi's you can transfer waypoints/favorites to the GPS with Garmin's smartlink app. There is no way to link this from Geocache pages or geocache apps that I know of. Maybe there is a way, but I have not seen it.

Cool, and the Garmin site has a list of compatible GPSrs: https://buy.garmin.com/en-US/US/on-the-go/apps/smartphone-link/prod111441.html

 

The OP could try that and see if it works. I guess you'd open the cache location in Google Maps or something and then send that location to the Nuvi?

[+Red90]

With the bluetooth Nuvi's you can transfer waypoints/favorites to the GPS with Garmin's smartlink app. There is no way to link this from Geocache pages or geocache apps that I know of. Maybe there is a way, but I have not seen it.

Cool, and the Garmin site has a list of compatible GPSrs: https://buy.garmin.com/en-US/US/on-the-go/apps/smartphone-link/prod111441.html

 

The OP could try that and see if it works. I guess you'd open the cache location in Google Maps or something and then send that location to the Nuvi?

 

There is no way that I know of to get that to work. The app has a location search of its own, but that does not find geocaches. I can't see any way to transfer location information from another app to it on an iPhone. This thread http://forums.Groundspeak.com/GC/index.php?showtopic=317024 says it works on android though.

[+Lord Cadogan]

If you use c:geo, then it can fire off an external navigation app. There are free OSM maps that you can load into the phone. They are not routable from within c:geo, but it can fire up an external app. There are some that you can preload the maps into the phone and then save the data cost.

[+geodarts]

If you use c:geo, then it can fire off an external navigation app. There are free OSM maps that you can load into the phone. They are not routable from within c:geo, but it can fire up an external app. There are some that you can preload the maps into the phone and then save the data cost.

 

Several android apps will do this (including gcdroid), as well as iOS apps (like geosphere). I link the caching apps I use to the free offline Here maps or Navigon and am good to go with a single button from the cache page. That is different of course than transferring coordinates to a Nuvi.

 

If Garmin's Smartlink has an API that allows it to accept coordinates from other apps, Geosphere would allow you to create a customized menu item that would transfer coordinates to it. But I have no idea if Smartlink is designed to handle such things.

Edited October 16, 2015 by geodarts