Trucking Navigation: separate device vs. phone app?

You can use the free 7 or 10 day trial of the Trucker Path app, the lowest paid level gives what you really need, You just need an email account. The free levels of Trucker Path just give you Google Maps routing with no consideration for vehicle length/legality and weight. It assumes you are in a car. To use the free trial you need to give your email address. If your email is [email protected] then uses the email address for your free trial period of [email protected]. All of the messages sent to [email protected] will arrive in your normal [email protected] inbox. If you want to continue your free trial then cancel your current free trial the day before it runs out and the next day sign up for another free trial using [email protected]. Trucker Path sees that as a new email address but it doesn't require you to create a new GMail account.

In my experience Trucker Path paid/free trial routing is just Google Maps routing plus some adjustment for semi-truck length and weight. I ran both a truck GPS and Trucker Path at the same time, all day every day for my last 3-5 years in trucking. I found my RM740 GPS to be better at most routes than Trucker Path. But most people will not believe something until they have tried their way first. So I just gave you help on how to use Trucker Path for free. Your truck GPS doesn't need cellphone network access to work. I used my GPS for routing and Trucker Path for road/traffic/parking info. Trucker Path was running on my phone if my wheels were turning.

One big downside to using Trucker Path for directions is any cop looking from the road will see just another truck driver screwing with this 'phone' if you do anything in motion. Your truck GPS is obviously not your phone. Also, never touch your phone or GPS while driving until you have looked everywhere for other traffic, are going straight, have no traffic near you, and verified no cops are in sight. A ticket for playing with your phone is very very bad ticket in trucking.

 

I've never used Trucker path so I can't help with that. I'm retired now so my advice is probably dated, but it's free and it worked well for me.
First, using the cell phone for navigation as well as communication seems a bit risky. If you lose the cell signal, you lose commo and nav both. Same if the cell phone dies, breaks, or gets left somewhere. Also, if your route takes you across or even near a Federal border, you risk incurring international rate charges.
Again old school advice, but worked for me. Route planning starts with the RM truckers atlas. I used a trucker GPS, but my route was planned with the atlas, the GPS will adjust to your chosen route. Usually. Keep in mind, a lot of GPS manufacturers get paid to make sure their generated route goes by this or that business. This route may not be your best route. For finding the shipper / reciever, A laptop with Google maps set to satellite view worked best. The address on the bills more often than not is the address to the white collar entrance, not the truck entrance. A satellite view, usually will let you see the actual truck entrance. And I've been places that required a totally different approach to that entrance even when the street address was the same.

 

I found looking up the customer on Google, and reading the reviews, usually indicated the truck entrance and any procedures the customer needed you to follow. Hopefully the customer is an industrial customer and not a customer with some trucks and some consumers. If so the reviews will mostly be about the products of the customer not the info useful for trucks.

 

I always use Google Maps on my phone. That being said I don’t always go the way it takes me, but I like that it shows my route and I can look it over before I ever leave and decide what changes I want to make. Truck GPS would take me sometimes an hour out of the way to avoid highways that were totally fine to take in a truck. They also show some roads as low weight roads so they route you around it and it’s actually fine for trucks. Just watch the signs and don’t totally depend on any electronic gadget. They all screw up some.

 

Whatever GPS you use will have some errors. Don't let discovering those errors make you think you have made a bad purchase. For example, my Rand McNally 740 showed wrong speed limit about 20% of the time. No big deal if you read street signs. The other more important error was at some major interstate highway splits the screen and the voice will say keep right to follow I-65, for example, but you need to keep left. This happened at particular splits, not random interchanges. It always happened in sight of the bug green overhead signs showing the interchange split and I learned near Oakland, CA and Indianapolis, IN to expect the wrong info and ignore it. Your eyes always override what the GPS shows. I later replaced my RM740 with A Garmin 770. It had another common error. It would sometimes say exit here and then get back on the highway. Say you are driving across Nebraska headed to Colorado. You aren't making any exist in NE. You are driving across the interstate from one end of the state to another on that same interstate. Garmin would sometimes say exit on exit 204, then near end of off-ramp Garmin would say at traffic light go straight to enter the interstate highway at exit 204. The whole exit and return was pointless and should have been ignored. These are small issues and you will learn to ignore them. The issue is for drivers that never look at a map, never have a road plan, don't have the general idea of the routes they are going to use that day. Those drivers punch in an address and follow the GPS like a robot. Do not be one of those drivers. The GPS is offering suggestions. It works for you. You are the boss and the GPS is your employee and sometimes you have to ignore the GPS. Telling the cop 'I was just following my GPS' won't get you out of a ticket. So don't be tempted to turn over thinking to your GPS. It's mostly right, but sometimes wrong.

Beware of having 2 devices running at the same time. It's Very disturbing when one box is saying turn left and the other box is saying turn right and you don't know which is correct. Always look at your route before you start and have a game plan and recognize when the GPS is giving wrong info. Also areas with lots of new construction, or areas that are growing fast will have more bogus info coming from the GPS ebcause it takes a while for the new streets to get into the system.

Lastly, the GPS handle street addresses differently. My RM740 would only allow an address on a Street, Avenue, Parkway, etc within a certain address range. In its mind 407 Maple Street doesn't have any addresses beyond 600 Maple Street. It also was particular about Maple St and Maple Street, or Ave and Avenue. In those cases I would turn to Google. Then there are customers with useless addresses like 1 Success Way, instead of 805 Ellington Parkway. So you may have to look up addresses by company name and see what the address is, or even better drop a pin for the truck driveway and then enter the coordinates of that dropped pin into your Garmin and navigate to the driveway. If in doubt ignore your GPS. You will learn it quickly. I'd mount it far from your phone so cops don't think you are messing with your phone and only touch the thing when there's nothing around and you don't have to turn, slow, go through intersections, etc.

 

The info given above is pretty solid, & bulletproof.

I had very similar experiences with my Garmin truck GPS -- so I should know.

A truck GPS can be extremely helpful -- but you have to know what its quirks & weaknesses are -- for such to actually be true.

Following/trusting it blindly all the time...each & every day -- will be very dangerous.

In the end -- it's the driver's responsibility to find a customer's/shipper's correct truck entrance -- & get there safely. Trust, but verify: check a generated given GPS solution....vs what Google maps satellite view shows, to check for true accuracy.

Once your GPS has a known correct solution, from start to finish -- it may well be a great idea to save said solution in the GPS, for future use.

You may well need it again, later.

Work smarter -- not harder.

-- L

 

The above-pictured Atlas is the definitive "Bible" for truck-designated routes, restricted routes, & other routes to avoid because of insufficient clearances, bridges not rated for large trucks/trailers...or similar.

To this day -- I still use mine (it's several years old now)...to ensure the routes I choose are truck-rated....& for truck-rated alternate routes around problems (like bad weather, wrecks, inadequate overpass clearances, etc).

The laminated page version will last longer -- & let you make notes on the pages with erasable inks.

-- L