Travelling with GPS

[Dee]

Hi Guys /Gals
I sent this to Highways and though maybe you folks might be more apt to respond?


Highway Readers, GPS users




I have a Garmin Nuvi 660 that I have used for a couple years, I also have a Garmin Etrex Legend Cx.
I have a couple issues I would like to ask you about. We are Rvers who tow a 35' Fifth Wheel
A few times we have listened faithfully to the gals instructions and gotten in a real pickle!
Now when you are in new or unfamiliar territory this can get to be a real pain in the backsides.
Just one example I will give you I live in Lompoc Ca we have an old county road , granted years ago it was highway one
but since has been taken over by the county. It also has sign's posted no truck trailer combo's
over thirty feet kingpin to axle. Yet on any trip out or to come home Garmin Lady tells us that is the route to take even though we have highway 135 or 246 which are both four lane roads.
Now as we know this area, it is no problem, but when we are in Washington or Oregon we are sort of at her Mercy!
The Garmin has a setting for Bike, Car, and so on how about one for trucks or big Rv's
We have tried the settings for fastest route, or shorter distance. Both take us over Harris grade Hmm Some Ting Wong??
We have it set for truck at this stage and still it takes us, another example down main street Olympia Wa. telling us to stay on this street for 45 miles When I 5 runs parallel to that street and our destination was Everett Wa.
Do any of your readers know of a unit more suited to RV's or Trucks. What are the more knowledgeable folks using?

web22hsz@verizon.net

[exav8tr]

Dee, I did see a new Garmin for Truckers. I already have a in dash unit so I was not too interested in it, however, If we were to lose the one in the truck this would be one I would seriously consider. As I have stated earlier, I use the Rand-Mcnally trukcers atlas to plan my OTR trips and use the GPS as backup for mileage, etc. I have been caught in a pickle also so we usually only use our GPS when in a town without the trailer behind us. Great for resaturants, banks, post offices, Walmart, etc.

[Trailer Trash 2]

Hi Dee, I think we all have ran into these kind of problems, be it Garmin , Magellin, or Tom Tom. and as you say you are sorta at the mercy of the GPS unit and the type that you purchase. We just came back from Montana and went through Borwning and took Hwy 464 nice road less turns and hills farm land stuff. Garmin said the road was a dirt road for several miles, and would not route the planner for that way it was either Hwy 2 or 89. it is the fault of the mapping programers that these companies use for there devices. I get all my updates and there still wrong today on street ID and routing.
I have all three big name programs and they all have there problems but believe it or not the one I like best is my MS Streets and Trips very accurate but who wants a computer in there front seat.
I always pre route my trips now I dont like being put on a 1 way dead end street when pulling my Monty.

[KDS MONY]

Dee, your problem is common to all GPS units. They are wonderful for telling you where you are but you can not trust them to pick the best/safest route. The way we have chosen to deal with the problem is to pre-plan all trips with the rig and use the current Rand McNally Motor Carriers Atlas, it costs more than the regular version but it will show you all the designated roads for motor carriers(tractor-trailers) which avoids the height, weight and restricted road issues. There is also a section which lists all of these state by state. In general if a road is suitable for a tractor-trailer I probably can get our 65' rig down the road too. Lastly we use one of the sat maps(Live maps or Google maps) to look at the route, mostly looking for tight right turns and in CGs for tight spots or trees. Old places that we have been to aren't the problem, it's the new ones that really worry me, I just don't want to get in a tight spot and tear something up, so it is worth the extra effort to do the pre-planning, Best wishes, Jay and Kathy

[sfretts]

Hi,

If you look in prefences there is a way to set roads to avoid. I set mine to avoid secondary roads and gravel. There are POI's for low bridges etc. Once I set this, I had little problem with routing. It does sound like you have it set to prefer secondary roads over hiways and freeways. I also can set mine to avoid toll roads when possible.

Steve

[richfaa]

The problem we have with the two garmin GPS uuits we have is our choices are walking or auto..we are neither one of those. Most GPS units are set up for navigation by car not a big rig. The Garmin 465T is set up for trucker use amd I think we will get one of those.

[KDS MONY]

The T in the Garmin Nuvi series stands for Traffic. Around the big metropolitan areas you can get warnings for traffic delays for accidents, construction etc. There is a small illuminated band around the 12v plug base that comes on when it is active. We have not found that it is otherwise any better about routing then the others. The newer Garmins will let you put in multiple way points in a single route, which is how we force it to go the way we want to go based on our pre-planning. On longer routes it sometimes takes 3 or 4 waypoints to get the route set up as desired, Best wishes, Jay and Kathy

[bigmurf]

Silly me, I don't trust Garmin for a minute. We look at a map and go. I can back up the rig when needed.

My pet peeve is why can't the GPS change to the time zone I'm in? Thing knows where I am and the zones are fixed lines, so what's the problem?

BTW: My wife can read a map. (She is looking over my shoulder) g

[richfaa]

One of the MOC'ers in our recent road trip had the 465T and it has a car mode and a truck mode. You can set your data..length, Weight, Height, etc in truck mode.

[CasaDelSol]

I plan out trips by Google maps and then use the Garmin as a backup. I check the route it gives us against the Google map. We had problems with routes and bridge clearances until I figured out that I could set it for "truck". Hopefully we won't have those problems again. Unfortunately Mapquest and Google maps don't let you program for trucks. We have an Atlas as a backup. Hard to read when bouncing along in the truck though.

[db_engineer]

My Tom-Tom has gotten us into a fix several times. I've learned the hard way to plan well ahead. There is a program I use called Tyre http://www.tyre.tk/ that links to both Tom-Tom and Garmin. It interfaces with Google Maps, allowing you to set waypoints for the route you want to take, save it as an itinerary file, then upload it to the GPS. Then I let the GPS plan the route, review the details for deviations, and use Tyre to set more waypoints to tweak the GPS's routing. It's a bit of a pain, but has kept me out of a few tight spots since I started working that way.

[camper4]

we had an early Garmin and it was great. Never had the issues we have had with the newer ones. We have been sent down dead ends, sent east before going west, sent on roads that never were, etc. I talked with Garmin about it and they told me to reboot. I did with same results. That unit crashed and I replaced it with the same thing, believing the GArmin rep when he told me my unit was screwed up and a new one would not be.
Next one will be a truck version but anymore we have a map to go with the Garmin. We really loved our first one, street pilot 2610.

[01RAMer]

quote:Originally posted by bigmurf

My pet peeve is why can't the GPS change to the time zone I'm in? Thing knows where I am and the zones are fixed lines, so what's the problem? g

I believe you can set the unit for time zones. I have the Garmin Nuvi 1490T, and it will let you select how you want the time displayed.

[hazmic]

Have you tried the up date chip from garmin? Now all you to is stick the up chip in the side and forget it. Waiting to try mine.

[bigmurf]

quote:Originally posted by 01RAMer

I believe you can set the unit for time zones. I have the Garmin Nuvi 1490T, and it will let you select how you want the time displayed.

I know I can set the time zone I want. My question is why the unit can't (won't) do it.

[skypilot]

As Rich mentioned above, Garmin has come out with a 'newer' version called the Nuvi 465T which is its ownly 'Truck' GPS. It contains the equivalent of the trucker's atlas and several other features in it -- including where you enter your length and heigth so it can let you know of height and length restricted roads (or hopefully keep you off of them). I am looking into purchasing one, however, it is not an immediate need since I also use a map along with my current NUVI 750.

We had a 'job fair' at the work place last year and Garmin was one of the many firms who came looking to hire graduating students. I asked the Garmen (and Magellan) folks about the problem with dead-end and inappropriate road choices. Both manufacturers deferred and said they were at the mercy of their mapping providers for current / correct information. In fact, the latest update on my Nuvi stated during the initial boot-up after updating to notify them if I found roads out of place, closed or new and not correctly shown...

[sreigle]

Dee, your rig is considerably less than 30 feet, kingpin to axle. I measured our 3400 and it's under the 30 ft also. We've done several of those roads with those signs and while some can be challenging, we've gotten through just fine.

It seems different GPS units, including within the Garmin brand, have different options. My Garmin StreetPilot 2720 has a Truck option and a Bus option. I like the Bus option as it will not route me on any road not suitable for a bus. That is also true with the truck option but that option usually routes me on the rough and usually unscenic truck routes. The bus route is my preference.

My Garmin Nuvi 1490T, which is now my main GPS, has only auto, pedestrian, and bicycle options. No truck or bus.

I haven't checked my Garmin eTrex Visa Cx but I don't use it in the truck anyhow.

There is a Garmin GPS that is made for truckers and works for rv'ers. A friend has one and loves it although it does not have some of the features my Garmin has and that's why I didn't go with that model. But it would work for many. The model is the Nuvi 465T. Here's a link to this model on the Garmin website. By the way, you can find it online for much less than Garmin's list price, I'm sure.
https://buy.garmin.com/shop/shop.do?pID=31541

Good luck. I hope you find what you're looking for.

[Dee]

Hey thank all of you folks for your replies, this is indeed a great resource.
I am going to keep in mind the Garmin Truck model before leaving on our next big trip.

Thanks again Dee

[Wschep]

Steve Regiel

Why did you go with a gamin that no longer has a bus option?