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Miss_Duracell_Bunny
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Miss_Duracell_Bunny

Miss_Duracell_Bunny

Posted
Posted

Hello everyone.

 

I'm new to this sport and the world of GPS Can someone please tell me what a benchmark is?

 

Where can I get a geo coin?

 

And do I have to log a bug even if I don't move it.

 

I have read everything on the website but I can't work out the answers for my questions.

 

I have a geko 101 which my brother gave to me as an unwanted Christmas present he got. is this any good. It looks a bit childish like a cheep gameboy compared to the others I have seen on ebay.

stu_and_sarah

+stu_and_sarah

Posted
Posted

> I'm new to this sport and the world of GPS

 

Welcome!

 

> Can someone please tell me what a benchmark is?

 

It's the US equivalent of a trig point. A known point, used for surveying.

 

> Where can I get a geo coin?

 

To buy, I don't know. To find one, just search caches! An icon will show up in the cache list if there's a geocoin in it. But you'll have to be quick - other people will surely be rushing for it!

 

> And do I have to log a bug even if I don't move it.

 

No. You don't. You can leave a bug in a cache, and not log it.

 

Some people choose to note down the number and log the bug out of the cache and back in - because then it's added to the list of bugs they've found.

 

Whatever you do, don't move a bug and NOT log it!

 

> I have a geko 101 which my brother gave to me as an unwanted

> Christmas present he got. is this any good. It looks a bit childish

> like a cheep gameboy compared to the others I have seen on ebay.

 

It should be perfectly suited to geocaching. Later you might want to

upgrade for maps or colour or whatever, but for now, you'll get by

just fine with the Geko.

 

Good luck!

 

Stu

Deego

Deego

Posted
Posted (edited)
Test...

 

  Does my pic show? Pink bunny...

 

Testing testing

No it doesnt :P

 

after you change your avitar you need to click the discuss geocaching link. That will then update the forums software.

 

And welcome to the mad house :D

 

Brian

Edited by Deego
The Hokesters

+The Hokesters

Posted
Posted (edited)

Hello Miss. DB,

 

Welcome to the addiction. I think Stu has answered all your questions so far but holler if you have any others.

 

Prepare to lose your sparetime :D

 

Si from The Hokesters...

 

P.S. I have a Geko 301 which although not dayglo yellow has all the features of your 101 - give me a shout if you need any advice with it. It is perfect for GCing though so no need to upgrade just yet.

Edited by The Hokesters
lordelph

+lordelph

Posted
Posted

I use a Geko 201 after deciding I wouldn't need all the fancy schmancy features of more expensive models. Works just fine for me, and you can pretend it's a mobile phone to disguise your activities!

 

I found my first Geocoin on Jan 1st, and it's still in the place where I dropped it off after a week (GCCE5E). Your profile says you're in London, so to grab this one you'd have to drive up the A1 to Hitchin or take a train+bike!

Miss_Duracell_Bunny

Miss_Duracell_Bunny

Posted
  • Author
Posted

I can see my little photo now.

 

Thank you all for your quick response

 

I'm going to try and find my first cache on Saturday morning the nearest one is not far from me. I think I'll take my brother's dog for security, with a little bit of luck I could train him to sniff out Caches

 

Yeah I’m from London but I will stick to local Caches until I know what I'm doing.

Thanks for the info tho. :D

NickPick

NickPick

Posted
Posted

I've had my etrex working on a 747 to India and a ryanair flight from Ireland. I had to hold it close to the window, and it took a while to get a sattelite lock.

 

One thing to note though - no electronic equipment to be used during takeoff and landing, and don't be suprised if someone else thinks it's a mobile phone and tells you not to use it.

 

And don't try explaining to the stewardess that it's a gps, the pilot has one up front and it won't affect the planes systems, she probably won't believe you and you don't want to get thrown off in mid-air do you :D

The Hokesters

+The Hokesters

Posted
Posted

Yes - but normally only from a window seat.

 

You need to check with the airline you are flying with to see if they allow the use of GPSr's too. Actually they all should allow it. There is no reason for not banning their use as they only receive GPS signals which are already there with or without a device to collect the signal.

ribel

+ribel

Posted
Posted (edited)
... the pilot has one up front...

GPS is not approved in this country (nor most worldwide) for air navigation, therefore not a lot of airliners have them fitted. Navigation is still via good old fashioned radio stations on the ground!

Edited by ribel
Miss_Duracell_Bunny

Miss_Duracell_Bunny

Posted
  • Author
Posted
... the pilot has one up front...

GPS is not approved in this country (nor most worldwide) for air navigation, therefore not a lot of airliners have them fitted. Navigation is still via good old fashioned radio stations on the ground!

Is that something to do with what I read in my GPS manual about inaccurate readings of altitude? :P:D

ribel

+ribel

Posted
Posted
... the pilot has one up front...

GPS is not approved in this country (nor most worldwide) for air navigation, therefore not a lot of airliners have them fitted. Navigation is still via good old fashioned radio stations on the ground!

Is that something to do with what I read in my GPS manual about inaccurate readings of altitude? :D:P

I think it's mainly down to the fact that it's a US Military system, and could be switched off (or scrambled) at any time - for military reasons or otherwise.

 

I think Europe plans to send up it's own GPS satellites in the near future, although I'm uncertain of their purpose, civil or military.

 

As far as I know, GPS technology is as accurate (if not more so) than what's currently used for air navigation.

 

Forester, feel free to step in here anytime... :D

 

ribel

 

PS - Welcome to the forum

McDeHack

+McDeHack

Posted
Posted

Oh yes. welcome to that Pink rabbit thing.

Loads of light ary-plane flyers use GPS. Better than cone of uncertanty.

'where is that bl***y air field its here some place? Ops! It's under me.'

 

I AM NOT MAD AND I HAVE A CERTIFICATION TO PROOVE IT. :D

Brenin Tegeingl

+Brenin Tegeingl

Posted
Posted
I think Europe plans to send up it's own GPS satellites in the near future, although I'm uncertain of their purpose, civil or military.

 

Here you goEGNOS, a non military system, but which there is agreement with the US, over SA (SELECT AVAIBLEITY) in areas of conflict.

 

Dave

sTeamTraen

+sTeamTraen

Posted
Posted (edited)
I think Europe plans to send up it's own GPS satellites in the near future, although I'm uncertain of their purpose, civil or military.

 

Here you goEGNOS, a non military system, but which there is agreement with the US, over SA (SELECT AVAIBLEITY) in areas of conflict.

 

Dave

I think you may be confusing EGNOS and Galileo.

 

EGNOS is a local (European) augmentation to GPS. When the Yanks turn off SA on GPS, EGNOS won't help you much. EGNOS is going to be fully operational "Real Soon, Now" (but then they've been saying that for about two years).

 

Galileo will be a European-controlled network, equivalent to GPS and then a lot more. That's the one which we've had to agree to switch off in case someone in the White House imagines it will make a blind bit of difference (they seem to have a rather higher-tech idea of how terrorists work than most of us).

Edited by sTeamTraen
John Stead

+John Stead

Posted
Posted
> And do I have to log a bug even if I don't move it.

 

No. You don't. You can leave a bug in a cache, and not log it.

Please dont' leave a bug in a cache without logging it in as they all record their accumulated mileage which is of interest to their owners. If you take a TB from a cache log it by "retrieving" it and then in its new cache home you can log it in by clicking it from your inventory when you log the cache find. If that sounds a bit complicated, you will see what it all means when you find your first TB. :P

 

Oh yes - welcome to the game/sport/obsession! :D

sTeamTraen

+sTeamTraen

Posted
Posted
> And do I have to log a bug even if I don't move it.

 

No. You don't. You can leave a bug in a cache, and not log it.

Please dont' leave a bug in a cache without logging it in as they all record their accumulated mileage which is of interest to their owners.

I assumed that Miss_DB meant "leave" as in "do not take, leave it where it already is" as opposed to "drop off". English can get pretty subtle sometimes, especially when viewed through the narrow cardboard tube of a forum post.

Alibags

+Alibags

Posted
Posted (edited)
Welcome Miss Duracell Bunny, need a guide and mentor?

You TART Young, and you still have not been round to mine with that box of Milk Tray yet either!! :D

 

Welcome to the madhouse, Miss Duracell Bunny. There are loads of caches in London and some of them are even bigger than micros, and when you get bored with them, leap on the train up to Berkhamsted, we've got lots!

 

If you are in London, why not come along to the Event on 10th Feb. I have not got the link to hand just now, but I am sure people will leap in with it.

Edited by Alibags
Messe

+Messe

Posted
Posted
:D I think this is might be the link you might be looking for.....http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?guid=1eb2c542-75d3-4885-92af-d1026d923d94...copy and paste that in the address bar at top...bingo,follow instructions..dont know how to make a link straight from this page,sorry :P
John Stead

+John Stead

Posted
Posted (edited)
> And do I have to log a bug even if I don't move it.

 

No. You don't. You can leave a bug in a cache, and not log it.

Please dont' leave a bug in a cache without logging it in as they all record their accumulated mileage which is of interest to their owners.

I assumed that Miss_DB meant "leave" as in "do not take, leave it where it already is" as opposed to "drop off". English can get pretty subtle sometimes, especially when viewed through the narrow cardboard tube of a forum post.

You are so right! I got it wrong but at least I was able to vent my pet gripe about people who do not log TBs properly when they move them. That and people who do not bother to loge them at all for weeks after they have retrieved resulting in me travelling miles for a TB I want to find it not there, if you see what I mean!

 

Incidentally anyone know why the punctuation of the word "don't" reads "dont' " in the posting but correctly on the editing page?

Edited by John Stead
Messe

+Messe

Posted
Posted
:( Exactly...went to grab Jeep TB...but was gone....ok..another cache under the belt...but not another Jeep......if not going to log it,why take it??? :rolleyes: .ok some people only have access to the firms computer so cant log it for a few days...but weeks is not in the sporting interest....so come on folks log TB`s ASAP
The Forester

+The Forester

Posted
Posted
> Can someone please tell me what a benchmark is?

 

It's the US equivalent of a trig point. A known point, used for surveying.

Wrong!

 

A benchmark in the UK is solely for vertical reference.

 

It is usually carved into stone or concrete, a shape of a horizontal line which has a pair of inwardly angled lines beneath it. The centre of the horizontal line is the indicated point. Its height above Ordnance Datum (mean sea level at Newlyn in Cornwall) is recorded and is available from the Ordnance Survey.

 

The co-ordinates of a benchmark are not accurate as they are only intended to be used to enable a surveyor to find the benchmark. The height above Ordnance Datum is recorded to millimteric precision.

 

 

Cheers, The Forester

NickPick

NickPick

Posted
Posted

 

A benchmark in the UK is solely for vertical reference.

 

It is usually carved into stone or concrete, a shape of a horizontal line which has a pair of inwardly angled lines beneath it. The centre of the horizontal line is the indicated point. Its height above Ordnance Datum (mean sea level at Newlyn in Cornwall) is recorded and is available from the Ordnance Survey.

 

The co-ordinates of a benchmark are not accurate as they are only intended to be used to enable a surveyor to find the benchmark. The height above Ordnance Datum is recorded to millimteric precision.

 

Unless the house / building owner has:

Rebuilt that corner of the building;

Extended from that corner;

Decided that rendering / stone cladding would be nice;

grown a nice big thorny bush in their garden right at the BM location;

etc...etc...etc...

 

Can anyone guess that I've done a fair bit of level surveying in my life?

 

When they have done this, the next nearest BM is usually 2 miles away (which needs a 4 mile walk to level properly)

 

And the precision is usually very good (levels marked on OS 1:2500 maps) unless you live in a coal mining area which is prone to subsidence!

Chris n Maria

+Chris n Maria

Posted
Posted
> Can someone please tell me what a benchmark is?

 

It's the US equivalent of a trig point. A known point, used for surveying.

Wrong!

 

A benchmark in the UK is solely for vertical reference.

 

hmmm,

 

I think the question was relating to benchmarks within Geocaching.com which are the US ones. In the uk the equivelant is trigpointing which can be found at www.trigpointinguk.com.

 

Chris

The Forester

+The Forester

Posted
Posted
... the pilot has one up front...

GPS is not approved in this country (nor most worldwide) for air navigation, therefore not a lot of airliners have them fitted. Navigation is still via good old fashioned radio stations on the ground!

All modern airliners have GPS. It is widely used for en route navigation and in the US most airports have a non-precision GPS approach which is published by NOAA and approved by the FAA.

 

In fact, there is some concern in pilot circles that GPS may actually cause a collision as it is so much more accurate than VORs and NDBs and aircraft flying directly between VORs using GPS will be ontrack to within less than half a wingspan whereas in the old days of round-dial en route nav they would be lucky to be within half a mile of centreline.

 

In the UK the CAA/NATS have flown test approaches in the RAE BAC-111 using GPS as a substitute for Cat I ILS and have found that it actually meets the standards for Cat II ILS and comes extremely close to meeting the requirements for a full Cat II Autoland.

 

NATS is very keen to introduce GPS as a precision navaid as it will enable them to establish multiple approach routes simultaneously to a single runway. They've designed a cunning set of S-shaped approaches to each runway so that the approach controllers can sequence aircraft onto finals alternately from left base and right base keeping optimum separation between aircraft of widely differing speeds. This is not possible with any of the conventional navaids (except the lamentably abandoned MLS which was aborted because of the forthcoming introduction of GPS).

 

Cheers, The Forester

The Forester

+The Forester

Posted
Posted
I think the question was relating to benchmarks within Geocaching.com which are the US ones.

Aah! I see.

 

Another case of two nations being divided by a common language!

 

The Murricane useage of the word "benchmark" is completely different to the British one. In the UK there is a huge difference between a benchmark and a trigpoint. There is no triangulation involved in a benchmark in the UK.

 

Another example of confusion in the Murricane phraseology is in what we in the UK call a transit. A transit is an extended straight line projected by aligning yourself with two fixed points. So long as the two points remain in conincidence with eachother, you are on the transit, although you don't automatically know your distance from either of them.

 

On some coastlines, particularly around harbours or in major estuaries, you can see examples of transits. You can see a pair of markers: the seaward one has its triangle mounted with a point upwards and the landward one with its point downwards. A navigator steering his vessel such that the points of the two triangles are aligned with eachother will be very precisely on the transit.

 

Confusingly, the Murricanes call a transit a "range" despite the fact that a "range" does not indicate your range (ie distance) from either of the points in the transit.

 

Cheers, The Forester

Miss_Duracell_Bunny

Miss_Duracell_Bunny

Posted
  • Author
Posted
Miss Bunny

 

You are a wind up.

Reveal yourself!

I wish to claim my £5.00

 

What? :rolleyes:

 

A wind up?

 

Yeah I'm a wind up I'm not real at all your £5.00 is in the post.

 

I justt spent all of yesterday reading everytinng I could find about this sport and I'm still confused, how does this make me not real? :(

 

I'll prove I'm real I'll come to this event thing in london next month.

The Forester

+The Forester

Posted
Posted
When the Yanks turn off SA on GPS, EGNOS won't help you much.

They switched SA off several years ago. They've retained the right to switch it back on again without notice, but they are unlikely to do so (unless Shrub throws his rattle out of his pram).

dysdera

+dysdera

Posted
Posted

I cannot believe how many posts the pic of an attractive girl sitting on her bed attracts. Even an offer of company on the hunts :(

Arent we all such a kind and helpful lot eh, wonder how many offers and replies would have appeared without such a lovely name, nice pic and a few well placed comments.

Maybe this is just me being cynical though :(:rolleyes:;);):mad::P:P:P

Miss_Duracell_Bunny

Miss_Duracell_Bunny

Posted
  • Author
Posted
I cannot believe how many posts the pic of an attractive girl sitting on her bed attracts. Even an offer of company on the hunts :(

Arent we all such a kind and helpful lot eh, wonder how many offers and replies would have appeared without such a lovely name, nice pic and a few well placed comments.

Maybe this is just me being cynical though :(;):P:P:P;):P:P

:rolleyes::P:mad::)B)

 

.....................

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