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Standing Still At 1,000 M.P.H.!!!


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...with my Etrex Legend! I was standing on a street corner doing a MetroGuide 5 "find" for the nearest fast food at about 1:20 this afternoon. Something caught my eye and I realized numbers were changing and I was just standing there. The speed was at 980 and I watched it accellerate an additional 2 MPH per second to 1,080. I toggled through all of the different pages and everything indicated that I was zipping across the sky at tree-top level almost as fast as the Concorde! The map page showed that I was in Canada while I was actually in Washington, DC. It would've continued on, but I decided to turn it off and try turning it back on to see if that would fix it. It did. In hindsight, I should've let it continue tracking around the world! That would've been an awesome saved track icon_biggrin.gif

 

If anyone is interested, I have the .mps file available...

 

Now, I'm wondering if I can ever trust my GPSr again!

 

Have any of you had any such anomalies with any of your units?

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Welcome to the world of National Security. You can get some heads up on area GPS outages by calling Flight Service Centers (1 800 wxbrief from most locations). Select a live briefing and ask for "Notams related to GPS outages" in your area.

 

But, not all outages are pre-scheduled and noted. And, there will be lots of them while the President jumps around the country on the campaign trail.

 

-jjf

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It happens from time to time. The more you use your receiver, the more you're likely to see it, especially if you get into areas where reception is tough. My eTrex's sometimes like to do a little ricochet rabbit thing when I crest ridgelines. My sportrak often goes on walkabout as I call it when I'm in the mountains or dessert canyons. The other day while sitting on a rock on the side of a mountain, I was peering through my binoculars trying to find myself. My sportrak insisted I was out there somewhere, about 10 miles distant moving along at approximately 12mph.

 

My all time record though was captured in a track I recorded on my GIII+. When the space aliens abducted me, I was bounced around from Nevada, to Wyoming, to Arizona, to Utah very rapidly for about 15 seconds. (My track ended up looking somewhat like a giant strarburst) In that time, I covered over 8,000 miles. Pretty impressive if you ask me. I don't remember the scenery however as the aliens erased my memory prior to dumping me out of the spacecraft.

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Just a thought, but could that 1000+ mph reading have been the speed of the satellite, and for some reason the GPSr was told the satellite was stationary and the GPSr was moving instead of the other way around. As I understand, the satellites would be moving at around 1000 mph to keep geosynchronous orbit. Just a guess though.

 

Nyarlotep

"God was my copilot, but we crashed in the mountains and I ate him"

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quote:
Originally posted by nyarlotep:

Just a thought, but could that 1000+ mph reading have been the speed of the satellite ....

 

.... As I understand, the satellites would be moving at around 1000 mph to keep geosynchronous orbit. Just a guess though.


 

GPS Sats travel at around 4km/sec (~9000mph) and also aren't in a geosynchronous orbit otherwise the system simply wouldn't work.

 

This is just one of those things, the other 5%.

 

Cheers, Kerry.

 

I never get lost icon_smile.gif everybody keeps telling me where to go icon_wink.gif

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Like WOW man...

 

--------------------------------------------------

If you're ever stuck in some thick undergrowth, in your underwear, don't stop and think of what other words have "under"; in them, because that's probably the first sign of jungle madness.

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I tracked my way across Europe and the Atlantic on a United flight last winter. Found my unit, simply held near the window, was much more accurate than the map screen in the plane. Moreover, I could look down and identify specific cities and topo features as we passed over them. As the GPS unit is a passive receiver of signals, I can't see any reason for airlines to ban their use onboard.

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My E-Trex Vista does that all the time when I use it in the car. I also noticed that anytime I get around a steel building the thing acts goofy like that also. I have a cabin built out of old steel from off a pole barn. If I am within 30 feet of that cabin I can't get the elevation and even when I mark the cabin and then do an aerial phote the waypoint is a mile away.

 

I contacted Garmin and was told that in the car it is expected. As far as the cabin they said the metal siding would make it act goofy but they didn't think it would as goofy as is it.

 

murph

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While driving north from San Diego to Temecula a month or so back, my eTrex was having trouble seeing through the car window, or some such problem. For a short while it jumped our position to about 400 miles out into the Pacific, and then back again.....maximum speed 4382mph!! Anyone had a faster reading than that??

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I couldn't resist watching myself fly into Billings from Phoenix on Tuesday. Snatched my Vista out of the carry on and watched myself cruising at a comfortable 575mph. It was somewhat disappointing as I watched us fly over a good 40 caches from 36,000 feet, knowing I'd have to make a 300-mile roundtrip drive to get all the caches in this one area I'm looking for. icon_smile.gif

 

The only downside was the altimeter wasn't working in the cabin due to the cabin being pressurized. Meh.

 

Brian

Team A.I.

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quote:
Originally posted by Searching_ut:

My eTrex's sometimes like to do a little ricochet rabbit thing when I crest ridgelines. My sportrak often goes on walkabout as I call it when I'm in the mountains or dessert canyons. The other day while sitting on a rock on the side of a mountain, I was peering through my binoculars trying to find myself. My sportrak insisted I was out there somewhere, about 10 miles distant moving along at approximately 12mph.


 

I've heard of other people having problems with GPSr's on mountian peaks. Does any one know what couses that? I would think that on top of a mountian you would get a great signal.

 

78Firedog

 

--?If Prometheus was worthy of the wrath of heaven for kindling the first fire upon earth, how ought all the gods honor the men who make it their professional business to put it out??-- John Godfrey Saxe, (American journalist, poet, and lecturer) circa 1850

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Come to think of it, when I was flying from Guayaquil, Ecuador to Quito, my Legend was tracking in a zig-zag saw-tooth pattern for a minute or so. I was navigating to a waypoint (Quito VOR) at the time. I think it started tracking properly when I stopped navigation to the waypoint. I was SOOOoooo disappointed - thought I had a bad GPSr. But I still had a blast with it on the planes.

1585400_300.jpg

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I just did it again last evening; we went to grab some dinner north of Syracuse and the trip is about 60 miles each way. Once we arrived at home, the Vista indicated it had lost satellite reception, and the stats were amazing:

 

Trip Odometer - 1194 mi.

Moving Time - 2:46

Stopped - 20:25

Odometer - 01193.96

Max Speed - 2796 mph (Wheeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!!)

Moving Avg. - 430 mph

Overall Avg. - 383 mph

 

I didn't think the Jeep would go quite that fast.... must be the cold air temperatures :D.

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I just did it again last evening; we went to grab some dinner north of Syracuse and the trip is about 60 miles each way. Once we arrived at home, the Vista indicated it had lost satellite reception, and the stats were amazing:

 

Trip Odometer - 1194 mi.

Moving Time - 2:46

Stopped - 20:25

Odometer - 01193.96

Max Speed - 2796 mph (Wheeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!!)

Moving Avg. - 430 mph

Overall Avg. - 383 mph

 

I didn't think the Jeep would go quite that fast.... must be the cold air temperatures B).

You must have been using four wheel warp drive!

 

That would look cool on a cop's radar display. :D

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Trip Odometer - 1194 mi.

Moving Time - 2:46

Stopped - 20:25

Odometer - 01193.96

Max Speed - 2796 mph (Wheeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!!)

Moving Avg. - 430 mph

Overall Avg. - 383 mph

 

I didn't think the Jeep would go quite that fast.... must be the cold air temperatures :D.

And people wonder why WAAS has the ability to signal failure of the system and why that should be important.

 

(I'm not saying activating WAAS would prevent this - that's dependent on Garmin's implementation of WAAS to sense the error and cut off logging. But at least the tools are there if Garmin should choose it do it.)

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