GPS explanations

[jamesl2play]

The 72 H is available for £120 does not show a map but does need connection to a computer with a source for downloading way points ? in order to know where the destination is. The 72 H can not have a map coordinate loaded for destination ?

Yes you can load the co ordinates manually. You just have to either read them off a chart or as I posted earlier you can get them off an iphone app such as Navionics.

I went around Wiay with that method, worked perfect and was not to much of an ache to load.

Thanks Phil, Mapsource ordered ( I think)

[journeyman]

I have never discovered how to rename waypoints (which are confusingly also called marks) in Memory Map.

Double click the mark (or right click and select "properties")
Brings up a box where you can rename amongst other things, like alter position and symbol - also gives you the option of the name you want to appear on the GPS unit when sent. My Garmin 72 only allows 10 characters as a mark/waypoint so I find this useful when you have a name longer than 10 characters on Memory Map but want to create a useful 10 character alternative.

72H available for £89

[nickcrowhurst]

Have you guys tried using something like EasyGPS to do the tasks you would normally use MapSource for? I would guess it's probably a bit too basic...

I've used EasyGPS and Google Earth for years with the basic yellow Etrex, bought for £40 as a reconditioned unit from Garmin, years ago. I smear dielectric grease round the joint between the screen and body, between the battery compartment and its cover, and over the terminals, every couple of months. It's survived many rolls and recovery training in the sea, and was used to produce our sea kayaking guidebook to the northeast corner of the Gulf of Mexico. http://www.hiddencoast.blogspot.com
Next weekend I'm off to the Apostle Islands, Lake Superior, Minnesota, with my son, and I've loaded the Etrex with about 150 waypoints to cover all the points we might need in the event of changing weather. http://qajaqrolls.com/2012/05/apostle-i ... chart.html
The Etrex has never been in a dry-bag, and it sits exposed on my spraydeck, bolted onto a Garmin mount.
Yes, I'm cheap!
Nick.

[PhilAyr]

jamesl2play wrote :

Thanks Phil, Mapsource ordered ( I think)

Goodluck with that James. Most of the time I interface mapsource with Bing OS maps, but when you transfer a saved track file on to mapsource and then click on "view" you can then see the track on Google earth.

Phil

[Douglas Wilcox]

Journeyman

Double click the mark (or right click and select "properties"

Thanks for your help Journeyman,

I hadn't tried double clicking but doing so now it doesn't do anything on my installation. Right clicking doesn't bring up the properties option either. Maybe it is because the only maps I have are the Admiralty charts, maybe its the version: 5.4.2 build 1089. I will try an update or a reinstall.

Cheers
Douglas

[journeyman]

version: 5.4.2 build 1089

same version as the one I have. I'd be surprised if it matters which charts are being used as these are "overlay" items. I could be wrong though!
Right clicking routes and tracks also brings up properties, and allows these all to be renamed.
Eurion

[Jim]

Well even I'm learning!

I used a basic etrex for years, first one without a case and it died because the rubber band which the flap for the connector is part of unglued itself and allowed water in. It was replaced with a factory recon unit which I then used in an aquapac (with a sachet of silica gel to absorb moisture, otherwise heat can force the vapour in through the breather diaphragm) and stll have, although it is relagated to primarily MTB use. I then bought the newer basic etrex (they updated it a bit), also factory recon because I needed several units for a kite buggy event, this I still use sometimes as a speedo on my buggy. At the same time I bought the 76csx which has a much more useful and readable display. Like I say I have topo GB on it but mostly I set the trip computer screen to the 3 panel display with current speed in the biggest panel and use it as a speedo whilst recording a tracklog. It is a nicer unit to programme in campthan the etrex,andI have done that sometimes as a long term planevolves differently to the 300 waypoints I set on my PC before I left. Also because you have the map on the unit to look up waypoints you don't need to spend hours pencilling them all in or the OS map so you can actually pick the right ones to build a route.....

My etrex screen used to look like what Douglas describes Phils 72H screen looking like - one year I had a map of the small isles created entirely from about 300 waypoints - there was no basemap behind it!

Jim

[Graham T]

A couple of questions
Is the 76 csx worth it as a bundle over the 72 H yes I know this is subjective but opinions please.
The 72 I believe takes two AA batts so can be replaced as needed. Am I right that the 76 is a rechargable unit, so either it needs charging capability or spare lithium batteries to be carried ?

[Douglas Wilcox]

Thanks Eurion.


There must be something wrong with my installation. If I right click on a "mark" I don't get a "properties" option, I just get the same box of options you get if you right click anywhere else on the map. I will dig out the disk and try reinstalling.

Douglas

[journeyman]

76CSx specification - appears to be a discontinued product
72H specifications

both take AA batts.

[journeyman]

If I right click on a "mark" I don't get a "properties" option

as you scroll over the map area does the hand tool change to a pointer arrow as you approach/go over a mark, route or track?

The other way to get to the mark properties (although if you have a lot of them it seems hard to pinpoint the one you want) is to click on the "+" symbol next to the "Marks" listed in the lhs under "overlay objects" shown in your pic. This will open up a list of all marks, and on my version if you click on any of them the properties for that mark will appear.

I'm using this on Windows XP. Memory Map UK number for some tech help 0844 811 0950, found them helpful.

[journeyman]

Having already entering the realms of skegs and flasks with this discussion - with memory map the distinction between a mark and a waypoint appears to be that the "mark" is an individual point, whereas a "waypoint" is a "mark" in a "route":

from the Memory Map geek forum:

A Mark and a Waypoint are identical so you don't need to change one to the other. The only difference is how they are created and this is MM's phraseology. When you create a Mark you create just one at a time. You are quite likely to want to give it a name which means something to you e.g. let's say Ingleborough, and then another for Pen-y-Ghent. And let's have Whernside to complete the trio.

You then decide to walk round all three mountains (a fine walk it has to be said) so you create a Route. Every time you click on a point which is on the path you want to take, MM creates a Waypoint and joins it to the previous point to build your Route. These Waypoints are numbered and start at WP0001 and increment up automatically in the order in which you create them. As you click out the Route you get close to Pen-y-Ghent so click on its Mark to include it in your Route. It is still a Mark but it is now also a Waypoint on your Route. A Mark can be in a Waypoint in any number of Routes. Similarly a numbered Waypoint in one route can be Waypoint in another Route. When the second route uses it it picks up the name it already had e.g. WP0245 instead of creating another waypoint on top of it.

As a Mark could well be something significant you are quite likely to want to keep it but you might have more than one Route which uses it. You should therefore Lock the Marks you wish to keep because if you delete a Route, all the Waypoints along the Route are deleted except any which are locked (or any which are shared with other Routes).

You could easily approach things by clicking out a Route and then decide to rename some of the Waypoints e.g. WP0156 could be more meaningfully called M1-Junc15. Even though it is part of a Route you could choose to lock it. Is it then a Mark or a Waypoint? In practice they are one and the same, dots on a map.

Waypoint navigation is about identifying the points you want go to (or want to avoid by a defined distance!). Waypoints are the more accepted term in navigation. I guess MM felt it useful to have a different name for miscellaneous points so called them Marks.

Off now to pre-warm my flask with boiling water. . .

[budgester]

For plotting my trip I use my android smart phone (motorola defy) with Endomondo in an aquapac.

This has all the bounses of having a tide time app on it, weather updates, and full UK navionics charts are available for £20.99

[budgester]

I also have a Cobra MRHH 475 VHF that is linked via bluetooth to my phone so I can use the waterproof vhf as a voice activated handset to make and receive calls with on my phone.

[Graham T]

Glad to see I am not the only one who is increasing their knowledge, it is a kind of comfort to know not everything is obvious to everyone else.
Thank you for the links to the specs of the two units mentioned by me for comparison however I have looked and the 76 csx is still available. The two units appear the same to me except for the visible map on the 76csx. My question was that given units are both on sale or that I can until the end of may get an extra 10% off is the 76 worth paying for ? I would say it is not worth it for me on the face of things until getting into the fact it appears I still need maps or charts to use with the 72 H (have I got this right)?
That although their are free options (thanks again Phil) they are perhaps not as good as others which have to be paid for perhaps making the 76csx bundle more attractive.
I asked the question is it worth it because to cover the whole of England Wales and Scotland I could pay up to £165 for each of four maps. The 76csx is available with a bundle package including a map worth £169 according to the blurb but I do not know if this is a poor base map or even how much of the UK coast it covers.
My budget allows me to buy any of them but being not unlimited in funds and with many others areas of spend I am trying to be selective and make more logical choices so I get what I need/will benefit from rather than having bells and whistles which are not really of value to me. I also plan to buy some plotting instruments, could do with more charts and to practice the exercises in Francos book, as electronic tools can and do fail (sorry I digress)
Having read so much on this thread (glad I started it now, such a wealth of unexpected knowledge) I think I would find it interesting also to know the speed I paddle at with different techniques and paddles, more acurrately or as a check for my working out how far I paddled etc, as well as my transit judgment. For me it is a toy at this point, fun and instructive I hope, and I am looking to the future as to what is going to be best. Possibly I should go cheap and if in 12 to 18 months time think they are the best thing since a Greenland paddle I can buy again, so having a back up also .
Now please answer the question which one should I buy before my brain blows a fuse ha ha

As a side note I joined the technology revolution and have a mobile phone basic pay as you go for emergency use so do not have the clever gizmos or apps others have mentioned as alternative options, sorry which century are we living in, must be that Green land paddle I'm living nostalgicly in the past

[journeyman]

If you have the use of a PC and colour printer the I would go for the 72H and purchase a copy of Memory Map marine charts which for £50 will give you all the marine charts for the UK and Ireland. You can then print out (laminate or put in map case) the area that you will be paddling. (Obviously you could use OS maps as well) If you ever get a iphone/ipad/android then you will be able to transfer all the charts over and the app will act as a gps tracker showing your position on the chart, give your speed etc.
If you don't want to work with charts or maps, then buy the other one. Frankly the chart/map option is the way to go in my book as batteries go flat. With a compass and chart you have a back up.

[PhilAyr]

Hello Graham ~

I'm with Journeyman, and just to add you can print out the Bing OS map, laminate it and have that on your deck for free. GPS or no GPS I would have a map/chart and compass with me as a back up. If you are lost the GPS will show you where you are on the map as long as you have enough battery power.

As I said earlier apart from an electronic base map display the 72H does everything I want it to do.

.. Goodluck ;-)

Phil

[allan09]

Thanks for a great thread.

I have now discovered Bing maps and may give them a try - print out and laminate, before I go down the route of Memory Map. My wife has a smart phone so I also need to investigate the possibility of getting to grips with it as a gps/mapping tool.

I do like, up to a point, technology but I am afraid eventually I get information overload and rarely progress anything. My solution is for someone to tell me what they use, it works, then I just buy the same. I have found this to be a pretty foolproof way especially with new (to me) technology. I have as friend who is into various areas of technology and usually I buy what he has if its something I want. So he does the legwork and I just tag along.

[Graham T]

So bear with me a little longer please.
Is memory map different better than Bing maps ?
What is Memory map is it a CD disk with which to show the coast on my computer from which I can print any chosen section ?
I know Bing is for free but it looked like I would need a course in how to use it !!!!!!!!!!! what are you doing Friday Phil ? haha

So far then I need

Garmin 72 H
Garmin lead for computer
Memory map
Laminator
I have a color printer but will need a truck load of ink argh now that is an expensive rip off
Paper
Plastic to laminate

I will search as always but may as well ask here as a one stop shop for advise on this subject.
Best/good paper and size
Good plastic for lamination which does not crack/yellow or leak
Cheap laminator which does the job
And if anyone knows of a source of ink for an Epsom C6600 printer which is not a dribble for £30 they will be a hero (yes I have looked repeatedly)

[journeyman]

What is Memory map is it a CD disk with which to show the coast on my computer from which I can print any chosen section ?

It is a bit more than that.

The disk comes with an application as well as a load of files that are the marine charts for the whole of the UK and Ireland at various scales. With the application you can view these charts (and OS maps if you want to use these as well - you would need to buy these as an extra cost) at various scales depending on which part of the British Isles you are looking at. You do not need a GPS to use the application, but getting the best out of it I would suggest you do get a lead to connect a GPS to your PC (the 72H I think can use either a USB or serial connector - available from the memory map site).

You can use the application to :
-print out sections of coast up to A3 in size
-plan your route by putting in way points
-calculate estimates for trip duration
-measure distances between points and route lengths
-all the info you would have on a marine chart (tidal diamonds for set and rate of tides, buoyage, drying areas etc)

If you connect it up to a GPS then you can move information both ways
- move the waypoints and routes that you have entered on the PC (entered by simply clicking where you want them to be on the charts) over onto your GPS (to do this with the GPS alone requires manually entering lat./long. or grid figures for each point by hand - not impossible but frankly I'd rather be doing something better with my time)
- move marks over to the GPS that might indicate your estimated position at a given time for doing open crossings so you can compare your actual position en route to where you think you should be.
- import from the GPS tracks that you have logged while paddling which will obviously give you an indication of where you have been but also will give you the speed you were travelling at each given position along that track.
- import from the GPS any points you may have entered while paddling (nice cave, stack, anything of interest)

[Boots]

Can we have a separate symposium for GPS's so some one can show me!!!!!! :o) It can involve beer and keeping dry

Boots

[PhilAyr]

What is Memory map is it a CD disk with which to show the coast on my computer from which I can print any chosen section ?

It is a bit more than that.

The disk comes with an application as well as a load of files that are the marine charts for the whole of the UK and Ireland at various scales. With the application you can view these charts (and OS maps if you want to use these as well - you would need to buy these as an extra cost) at various scales depending on which part of the British Isles you are looking at. You do not need a GPS to use the application, but getting the best out of it I would suggest you do get a lead to connect a GPS to your PC (the 72H I think can use either a USB or serial connector - available from the memory map site).

You can use the application to :
-print out sections of coast up to A3 in size
-plan your route by putting in way points
-calculate estimates for trip duration
-measure distances between points and route lengths
-all the info you would have on a marine chart (tidal diamonds for set and rate of tides, buoyage, drying areas etc)

If you connect it up to a GPS then you can move information both ways
- move the waypoints and routes that you have entered on the PC (entered by simply clicking where you want them to be on the charts) over onto your GPS (to do this with the GPS alone requires manually entering lat./long. or grid figures for each point by hand - not impossible but frankly I'd rather be doing something better with my time)
- move marks over to the GPS that might indicate your estimated position at a given time for doing open crossings so you can compare your actual position en route to where you think you should be.
- import from the GPS tracks that you have logged while paddling which will obviously give you an indication of where you have been but also will give you the speed you were travelling at each given position along that track.
- import from the GPS any points you may have entered while paddling (nice cave, stack, anything of interest)

... and you can do all that with Bing ! The only drawback is that you are stuck with O.S. I think I am correct in saying that with Bing you need to install "Mapsource" as an interface with the GPS but with MemoryMap it comes with its own.

All my document and map printing is done with a cheap S21 Epson printer and cheap supermarket inks. No problems so far and I am very happy with the print quality. The laminator is a " Pavo" A4 and I bought a 100 pcs pack of A4 gloss laminating pouches from my local stationer for £8.

After a trip I just plug my GPS into the P.C. Transfer the data to Bing then Voila !!!... I print out a nice wobbly ( if I have been around carnage corner ) track superimposed on to a Bing OS map of where I have been.

Phil

[jamesl2play]

I am with Boots on this one because Phil, you just make it sound too easy and I know that is just not the case.

[Graham T]

Hi Phil

Time for a rant !!!!!! I have an Epson CX 6600 printer copies/prints are fine no worries, however I hardly use it so normaly have to clean the heads first. A new cartridge of black ink costs around £10 and the bloody printer has the cheek to tell me there is not enough ink to clean the head because they only put a dribble of ink in the new cartridge hence my reference to rip off.
The chip Epson have in the cartridges made Tescos brand almost unusable, a friend who prints a lot tried getting the cartridges refilled with iffy results, and has told me the catridges only have 3 or 10 ml of ink in them depending on the ones bought which is not known at purchase.
Anyway a full cartridge set of the colors from Staples was about £30 but I have found a three pack plus two extra black for £25 on the net this afternoon claimed to be guarenteed to work with this printer so I will give that a try.

RANT OVER ha ha sorry but I feel strongly about this. Hmmmm no rant not over the printer manufacturers who all seem pretty much as bad asa each other sell cartridges for new printers much cheaper tempting you to buy new, oh and my friend has now gone over to real cheap printers regarding them as disposable items

Yep rant fully over now.

Thanks for the info regards laminating research suggests go for the thicker pouches good paper no doubt some experience will help. I have A4 good quality paper for work is this really large enough ?
I presume a laminator which takes A3 will work with A 4 but not vice versa ?

I read Jim had used a kind of water proof paper from memory map that is ink jet printable but can not source this yet

[PhilAyr]

Can we have a separate symposium for GPS's so some one can show me!!!!!! :o) It can involve beer and keeping dry

Boots

I am with Boots on this one because Phil, you just make it sound too easy and I know that is just not the case.

That's a great idea !! However I don't think it will be very dry if it involves beer ! :-)

Phil

[Douglas Wilcox]

Eurion thanks again for the MemoryMap tips.

My MemoryMap will let me highlight tracks which I have imported. It will also highlight waypoints I have created and named in Mapsource then imported to Memorymap via a gpx file. Unfortunately it will not let me rename newly created Marks (despite a full reinstall). I am running it on a Windows 7 64bit Business Edition computer. Maybe its not compatable. I remember this was why I bought Anquet maps for their OS 1:50000 mapping. I just keep MemoryMap on my computer for the Admiralty charts now.

The secret with a lot of things you can do with a GPS track is the gpx file which can be read by many different sorts of mapping/photography applications including online ones like Bing, and Google Earth.

Although I use many of these applications with gpx files, I still use Mapsource as the prime tool for communicating with the GPS and generating the gpx file because it easily lets you edit the track log and chop off the beginning of the gpx file. (It will also let you join a track if it has got broken eg by going into a cave and loosing the satellite signal.) If you import directly into MemoryMap or Anquet maps you often get this sort of thing:


At the weekend we launched from Maidens and headed north. Even though I had reset the GPS on the beach at Maidens, the first point in the tracklog was down in the Solway where I had last used the GPS. This means there is a long straight line between the Solway and the real start point Maidens.

Maybe other GPS units don't do this but my Etrex, 72cs and 76csx have all done it.


This track was produced by downloading the GPS track into Mapsource, editing it to remove the spurious track at the beginning saving it as a gpx file then importing the gpx file to Anquet Maps then pressing the keyboard Prnt Scrn button while Anquet is on screen then pasting the screen shot into a photo editor,(Photoshop) then uploading the jpg file to Picasawebalbums then linking to that photo from here.

If you go to my Picasa page, one of the ways you can view the photos is on a geotagged map.

Douglas

[Chris Bolton]

Memory map does occasionally produce spurious tracks, more often when it loses the signal than at the start. It does have a function to "remove spikes" which works quite well. If it doesn't, or if I want to join routes, etc, I convert the .mmo file into .gpx using gpsBabel (free download - translates multiple gps formats), edit in Notepad and convert back.

Chris

[Jim]

Can we have a separate symposium for GPS's so some one can show me!!!!!! :o) It can involve beer and keeping dry

Boots

I am with Boots on this one because Phil, you just make it sound too easy and I know that is just not the case.

That's a great idea !! However I don't think it will be very dry if it involves beer ! :-)

Phil

Oi, I was going to say that!

[Boots]

Jim, I even got lost on the Ravensglass sea quest!!!

[Jim]

Hi Phil

Time for a rant !!!!!! I have an Epson CX 6600 printer copies/prints are fine no worries, however I hardly use it so normaly have to clean the heads first. A new cartridge of black ink costs around £10 and the bloody printer has the cheek to tell me there is not enough ink to clean the head because they only put a dribble of ink in the new cartridge hence my reference to rip off.
The chip Epson have in the cartridges made Tescos brand almost unusable, a friend who prints a lot tried getting the cartridges refilled with iffy results, and has told me the catridges only have 3 or 10 ml of ink in them depending on the ones bought which is not known at purchase.
Anyway a full cartridge set of the colors from Staples was about £30 but I have found a three pack plus two extra black for £25 on the net this afternoon claimed to be guarenteed to work with this printer so I will give that a try.

RANT OVER ha ha sorry but I feel strongly about this. Hmmmm no rant not over the printer manufacturers who all seem pretty much as bad asa each other sell cartridges for new printers much cheaper tempting you to buy new, oh and my friend has now gone over to real cheap printers regarding them as disposable items

Yep rant fully over now.

If you like I will give you a link to a website that sells replacement ink and chip resetters for DIY boffins to keep on using their Epson cartridges/chip without paying a kings ransom each time, it is however even harder to follow than this discussion about GPS's. If I put them on a scale of difficult to understand with this thread at 1, the printer ink site would be on 5 or 6. I was doing fine until one of the print heads gave up entirely and ended up buying a new Epson which had better 'security' in that you could only reset the chip if the cartridge was still half full, although reference to this has now gone and they seem to offer a resetter which will do it - unfortantely the blue print head on that replacement is so clogged I have given up with it and my last foray was to spend £30 on an HP printer in Morrisons, which I can't connect to my desktop because they haven't written any drivers for 64bit XP (I guess it is an unusual version of windows, never properly supported even by MS although since it is based on 64 bit server 2003 it gets windows updates fine because it is no extra work for MS to release them). I had to buy a laptop just so I could use my new printer!

Thanks for the info regards laminating research suggests go for the thicker pouches good paper no doubt some experience will help. I have A4 good quality paper for work is this really large enough ?
I presume a laminator which takes A3 will work with A 4 but not vice versa ?

Yes, in the same way that posting a kayak through a letterbox doesn't usually work (unless you have a steam roller and big pair of scissors available) trying to fit an A3 sleeve through a laminator only wide enough to feed A4 through is not really on. Of course if you have an A3 laminator you can feed your A4's through it in either orientation! Steam roller may be bad example to use in that analogy since the laminator is a heated roller.....
Check the thickness capacity of the laminator, ours at work will take 250 micron pockets (at A3) it wasn't cheap but the end result is robust enough and big enough to use as a place mat! Asda sell 150 Micron film which is just enough in my opinion (I have my own packet I use when laminating personal stuff at work, unless I ask the boss for a sheet of the thicker stuff in A3), anything thinner and you run a real risk of wrinkles - I don't know what my dad used to use but the film was so thin and wrinkled so much (wrong temp setting probably, or no adjustment on machine) that maps laminated with it would never sit flat, or stack up properly.
Top tip when laminating - trim off white space around the edge and maximise the film to film contact around the edge for a goos waterproof seal.

I read Jim had used a kind of water proof paper from memory map that is ink jet printable but can not source this yet

http://shop.memory-map.co.uk/acatalog/toughprint.html

Feck, that's gone up in price!
Mind you, A3 version for laser - might get a packet of that, have A3 colour laser at work, usually.
I broke the last one we had, er, I was printing booklets to the booklet finisher and my booklet never appeared so I figured I must have forgotten to press OK or something and tried again.... and again.
By the time 3 booklets were wrapped around the finisher rollers that unit was dead forever (well it was after our 'supplier/engineer' tried to clear it with brute force), but the copier itself was still working to the standard output tray until the fuser roller started to disintegrate.
For some reason then our 'supplier/engineer' decided not to repair it but find us another machine, which wasn't available straight away so we got a temporary machine for a couple of days. A month or so later that had to go to the client it was really for and we now have another temporary machine for a couple of days (2 weeks so far), but at least he maintains our colour printing capability!

I don't do easy answers.....

Jim