gps question

What kind of unit did you buy that has a separate antenna?? Mine just lays on my dash....It's bluetooth and connects wirelessly right to my laptop or handheld either one.

 

My preferred choice, a good radio and someone to pass/receive traffic info. GPS is only has good has the person who key the info in. Plus you maybe close to an accident before the GPS let's you know. Everything these day's is subscription service $$$.

 

I could use a bit of help here guys and gals. Basically, I would like to hear about any "unknown" issues concerning your GPS unit, and it's road usage for routing. Obvious exclusions need not be covered.

A recent trip brought this to light. I typically double check ALL roads within a plotted route. But I got lazy on this one trip. Simply because the road was less than 2 miles in length.

Salt Lake City, UT to Chico, CA... Routing showed me to take exit 158 off of I-80 in CA for about one north to Hwy 20. This exit saved me about 10 miles.

Passing exit 160, I thought to myself...something ain't right here. Cuz the next exit, and the map drawing of the road, looked like a half dozen Z's stacked up on each other. Shooting off of exit 158, only confirmed this. I would not even put my car up this road, it was about the width of a single car. So I done the flip, went back to the previous exit.

Anyone else know any places I need to cross off my list of "usable exits and roads" other than the obvious, of course?

 

I live here and I don't even know of this shortcut. Hwy 20 is straight off of 80, I can't even imagine where this shortcut exit is. The exit numbers are new around here. I have to check this out this weekend.

 

Uh...be sure you check it with a car ...preferably a 4 wheel drive. I'm not even sure whether the cow path of a road goes on once you get over the top. And you sure won't be making that turn (at the exit) pulling a trailer

Yes, 20 is a straight shot off of 80. But the road curves, therefor taking the 158 exit "would" be shorter. Not practical though.

 

So what kind of GPS do you use and does it have a truck setting?

 

You can go into the settings and tell it to avoid unpaved roads. It will then use the main roads.

 

Good advise. But useless in this case. Had I set it to avoid this road (it's paved) I would have also eliminated about 40% of ALL the roads I travel, outside interstates. I travel a lot of US and County routes. Even a few dirt roads I guess I could have set it for this one trip.

I'm using Delorme 2008 with an EarthMate. No it's not truck specific.

And as I stated earlier, I usually go over my routes before taking off. I double check all unknown routes against PCMiler. I got lazy in this case, I didn't zoom in to compare exits on the 2 programs, and added several unneeded miles to my trip.

Looking back at the route, I've noted that is was set to "quickest" not shortest. The actual savings DOES NOT exist, it would have been shorter to take the 160 exit. The "real" shortest route follows CA 70 from the north, which can produce hefty tickets.

Again, it was a lax moment on my part. And, I'm looking for input from other users of none "truck specific" GPS software to add information to my knowledge base and save some time.