Problems with GPS while on vacation...question.

[+Mr. 0]

This past week I was on vacation in the Ft. Lauderdale FL area from Columbus OH. Now when I'm up here I rarely have problems with my GPS II+ getting a sat. lock, as I have an external amplified antenna for it. Now when I was in FL, I had a very hard time getting lock. I let it autoacquire, and I also manually selected the area I was in, and it would get lock for a little bit, but then it seemed as soon as I moved it would loose all signal. Any ideas what might have been causing this?

[Eclipse Chasers]

Is the unit working as it did now that you have returned home?

[dave and jaime]

i have no experience with your unit but my magellan 315 must be re-initialized if it travels more than 300 miles with the power off. you didnt mention this so maybe your unit has similar limitations?

[+Mr. 0]

To answer both your questions. Yeah, it's working fine now that I'm back home. Also I did let it re-init (they say if you travel more than 500miles with the II+)....doing both an "Autoacquire" and manually selecting the state that I was in. It would re-init grab 4-5 sats. then I would think I was good to go. I would take about 4 steps and lose all signal. It didn't matter if I was out in the open or under trees the same thing would happen. The only time I was able to get it to work decently was if I had the sunroof on the car open and the antenna stuck to the roof. At home here in OH, I've had my antenna zipped closed in my backpack lying on the floor of the car and it still worked ok.

[+Gliderguy]

With my work in the FAA I know that some military installations regularly jam GPS signals. It is often done near White Sands New Mexico, for instance, but I don't remember if they do any of this kind of work in Florida.

 

In White Sands they typically limit their jamming to the overnight hours when few aircraft are using GPS.