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GPS question

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AADIVER
Admiral

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USA
966 Posts

Initially Posted - 07/11/2006 : 19:01:26

For Father's Day our daughter gave us a Garmin GPS 76, very high rated unit. But since I'm an electronic Luddite, it has far too many bells and whistles and buttons and rockers and pages and menus's, much, much too much for my simple requirements. Can anyone recommend a very basic, simple hand held GPS I can program a basic here to there track? Thanks in advance.

Frank Farmer
Long Beach, CA
aa.diver@verizon.net
http://mysite.verizon.net/aa.diver

PRETTY PENNY
'01 C-250 WK, Hull #558

Edited by - on

mfasis
Navigator

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114 Posts

Response Posted - 07/11/2006 : 19:07:19

I am no expert but the Garmin GPS 76 is about as basic as it gets. One step down from that and they dont support mapping. Anytime I have trouble with anything electronic I get one of my nephews to help me out. Maybe you can find someone to work with you on it.

Mark

Edited by - mfasis on 07/11/2006 19:07:36

Champipple
Master Marine Consultant

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6855 Posts

Response Posted - 07/11/2006 : 19:15:01

I have the 76...at the basic setup out of the box it is as easy as it gets.

Read the book and don't go any farther in it than you require to mark a waypoint, go to a waypoint and do the same with a MOB. From there you can learn as needed piecemeal

Edited by - on

AADIVER
Admiral

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966 Posts

Response Posted - 07/11/2006 : 19:24:08

What about the Garmin eTrex unit; 80 bucks at Walmart? Specs and description sound super simple to operate.

Edited by - on

Champipple
Master Marine Consultant

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Response Posted - 07/11/2006 : 19:45:07

Frank,

You are a dive master you can't tell me that you don't have the mental capacity to push a few buttons on a GPS. Everything is labeled superbly, as I am looking at mine right now.

I'd hate to see you return or not use something and also get a replacement - especially if it was a gift.

The menus on that thing are really really easy to use. They are probably even easier to figure out than the dive tables for your second dive on nitrox after having corned beef the day before....

The E-Trex is simpler to operate, but if I recall it runs on the same number of buttons. That model has a simulator mode as well to help you learn how to use it.

Take it out for a day and play with it. I gurantee you'll want to keep it!

Edited by - on

AADIVER
Admiral

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Response Posted - 07/11/2006 : 20:06:08

"...easier to figure out than the dive tables for your second dive on nitrox."

Tables...TABLES?! I don' use no stinkin' tables, I use a DiveRite 3 mix computer, the NiTek 3.

Okay, okay, I'll try and have more patience. But when I programmed a local waypoint, 3 nm away, the gizmo told me it was 20 nm away. Electronic devices HATE me, for some obscure reason.

Anyhow, thanks for all your support.

Edited by - on

Champipple
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Response Posted - 07/11/2006 : 21:15:45

Sounds like a typo in the seconds department.

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AADIVER
Admiral

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Response Posted - 07/11/2006 : 21:34:03

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by Duane Wolff
 Sounds like a typo in the seconds department.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">

No comprende.

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frog0911
Master Marine Consultant

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1349 Posts

Response Posted - 07/11/2006 : 22:17:50

Frank, the hardest thing to do on any GPS is putting in a waypoint. As the saying goes in computer land, garbage in equals garbage out. In other words, putting in the correct coordinates is the hardest thing to do and if you don't you won't get the proper result from any of the GPS computations.

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Champipple
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Response Posted - 07/11/2006 : 22:53:49

coordinates are entered in degrees, minutes and seconds.(plus hemisphere) one number off in any section and you could be going to the wrong location. In hindsight, 20 miles is probably a minute or two off)

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AADIVER
Admiral

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Response Posted - 07/11/2006 : 23:09:31

I got the lat/lon of my closest waypoint from Google Earth, less than 3 nm from the marina:
N 33 43' 23.51"
W 118 10' 51.15"

Here's my GPS entry: DIST TO NEXT 20.30 nm
N 33.43235
W 118.10511

What am I doing wrong?

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Lightnup
Master Marine Consultant

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Response Posted - 07/11/2006 : 23:09:56

Frank -

This explains why there was a waypoint near New Zealand entered in the used GPS I bought from you.

Steve

(Just kidding.)

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lcharlot
Master Marine Consultant

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Antigua and Barbuda
1301 Posts

Response Posted - 07/11/2006 : 23:44:58

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by Duane Wolff
 ... easier to figure out than the dive tables for your second dive on nitrox after having corned beef the day before....

<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">

Uh, oh. I have an ANDI Nitrox cert, and have made about 50 nitrox dives, but I don't recall my Nitrox instructor or the textbook we used in the training class, talking about special requirements relating to diet. Is there something like a cumulative "Corned Beef Toxicity" level I have to worry about, in addition to O2 toxicity and N2 microbubbles? The tissue compartment model in my Aladin Pro Nitrox dive computer doesn't calculate Corned Beef Saturation levels, only nitrogen, so maybe I better retire it and look for a more modern dive computer before my next trip, eh?

Edited by - on

msliles
Deckhand

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USA
4 Posts

Response Posted - 07/11/2006 : 23:58:37

Frank

You entered the Degrees, Minutes, Seconds info as Decimal Degrees. In the setup menu for the Garmin there should be a selection for DMS to enter Data in Degrees Minutes and Seconds. Or you may convert the DMS to DD.

Your 33 43' 23.51" should be 33.723197 and
118 10' 51.5 should be 118.18097

This should get you closer.

Marlin Liles

Edited by - on

AADIVER
Admiral

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Response Posted - 07/12/2006 : 00:54:31

"Your 33 43' 23.51" should be 33.723197 and
118 10' 51.5 should be 118.18097"

How do you get 723197 from 43' 23.51"?

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Champipple
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Response Posted - 07/12/2006 : 07:04:01

maybe I can help here

If on the clock the time is 6:15 am your decimal would NOT be 6.15 it would be 6.25 since 15 minutes is 1 quarter hour. It is essentially the same principal that marline is referring to. I am looking in the manual now to see if I can find where you need to change a setting.

Try this

turn on the unit, hit page then enter (this just gets you past the entry screen)

Press the Menu Key - This will bring up the menu for whatever page you are on in the GPS - one of your options should be Main Menu or it will tell you to press menu again to get to the main menu.

Once at the main menu you will see "tabs" along the top. Each tab has settings for different options. use the toggle button (middle circle) and select Location. It should be the third or fourth tab over. Toggle over to it .

The screen should change for the Location settings. The very first Item is Location Format. toggle down to it (if it isn't already highlighted) and select enter. Then Toggle down each press of the button will change the format to the next one in the list (there are 28). You want the format that looks like this:

Hddd*mm'ss.s"

select hit, and hit enter. Then go and edit your waypoint. I just entered your coordinates in and got something in the San Pedro Bay just outside of Los Angeles Harbor?

That right?

You

http://www.garmin.com/manuals/GPS76_OwnersManual.pdf Pages 55-57

Edited by - on

msliles
Deckhand

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USA
4 Posts

Response Posted - 07/12/2006 : 10:03:18

Frank

Duane is correct. The easiest way is to change the input format of the GPS to accept the form of data you currently have. You can change back and forth depending on your source of waypoints with no loss of accuracy as far as I can tell.

As to how you get from 33 43'23.51" I should have explained last night but I was beat from a good day of sailing.

This is a "new Math" type of thing. There are 60 seconds in a minute and 60 minutes in a degree. We need to convert from minutes and seconds to decimal degrees. Start with the seconds. Divide 23.51 seconds by 60 to get .3918..... minutes. Add .3918 to 43 minutes to get 43.3918 minutes. Divide 43.3918 minutes by 60 to get .723197 degrees. Add that to the 33 degrees to get 33.723197....degrees.

I plotted the difference between your decimal degrees and the calculated decimal degrees and got about 20.2 miles error.

Is that waypoint the "gate" out of Long Beach harbor?

Marlin Liles

Edited by - on

AADIVER
Admiral

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USA
966 Posts

Response Posted - 07/12/2006 : 14:28:22

Yep. That be the Queen's Gate. I'm in the Downtown/Shoreline Marina and I want to establish waypoints from my slip to Emerald Bay, frontside of Catalina Island. We're going there for a Fleet 24 cruise to the Corsair Yacht Club facility the end of the month.
I shall follow all your suggestions and report back. Thanks.

Edited by - on

AADIVER
Admiral

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USA
966 Posts

Response Posted - 07/12/2006 : 19:38:58

Following y'alls advice, I deleted the incorrectly entered waypoints, set the unit for degrees, minutes, seconds, re-entered my waypoints, and created a couple of routes. Now if I get lost out there...

...just call me Bozo.

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