A buddy and I did a morning ski session yesterday at Mt. Rose, and I turned my GPS on in my backpack before we started. I was able to record a track of everywhere we went, as well as our total vertical footage with the barometric altimeter (which was only about 11K in 2.5 hrs...we're slow...)

In a fit of boredom, I decided to map our track against the 3D map in Google Earth. What's the point? I dunno, but anyone with a sense of geekdom can appreciate. Now if I could only get a trail map overlay, that would be really cool.

Zane,

That's pretty cool. In ham radio we have a vhf system called APRS (automatic position reporting system) it utilizes a gps connected to a vhf radio that will report the gps coordinates at a specified period of time. Usually every 5 minutes or so. On the mountain tops are APRS repeaters that relay the info to a node that will in turn post the info to the internet. You can retrieve the info and see the track and current position of the mobile station. It can work with as little as a 1/4 watt transmitter in an altoids tin. Pretty cool for search and rescue to keep an eye on resources and search areas. The rest of the story is the ham that suspected his wife of "extra curricular activity" and put his mobile APRS in the trunk of her car. Let's just say the divorce was a slam dunk.

That is great! It could also be a poor nerd's Lojack. Nothing like showing up at the house of the guy who stole your car.

zane wrote:...I turned my GPS on in my backpack...to record a track of everywhere we went...to map our track against the 3D map in Google Earth.

Woah Zane! That is very cool.
How do you input the GPS track into the Google Earth?
Curious, Berk

I downloaded an app for Windows called GPS Trackmaker (I tried to use CompeGPS, but the download map feature wigged out, and the sat maps for Mt. Rose that I could get were summer.) GPS Trackmaker imported my track directly from the GPS, then I just clicked "Display in Google Earth" (you have to have Google Earth installed, obviously) and it overlayed the track data. I set the elevation exaggeration to "2." I think the free version of Google earth can import and display XML track data(kml), but GPS Trackmaker generated the file for me.

Zane, This is really pretty interesting technology. I just a couple days ago discovered (unintentionally) that .............. When you load waypoints and tracks from the Garmin GPS to MapSource, then open Google Earth, Google earth finds the Waypoints and Tracks and loads and displays them as in the image attached here. OR lets say it will be attached here when I figure out how to do it. HELP HELP. Of course this image is kind of an overview to give you the bigger picture, but in Google Earth you can zoom in etc.

Nice!! I think this is a really cool concept too, so I made a photo gallery album for "Maps, Charts, and Routes" where you can upload images of your overlayed GPS tracks.

In the future, it would also be cool to upload route files that can be imported into your GPS receiver, so you can theoretically recreate somebody's exact flight.

One thing that I like to do with Google Earth is adjust the "camera angle" and the terrain exaggeration. It makes the mountains look bigger and gives them some perspective.

Along the same lines, I like to download the GPS tracks to my favorite mapping program, National Geographic TOPO! I then save the flight, and can review it any time I want. Most mapping programs will allow, this, so you can pick the one you like the output most, on.
tom

Tom,

Post an image of your flight if you get a chance. If you can't find a way to export the overlayed track to a bitmap, you can always do a screenshot (SHIFT+Print Screen, copies to clipboard) then edit in Photoshop or GIMP.

I uploaded two sample maps with my track on them. The first is a large scale map of the whole flight, and the second is a detail of a portion of a 7.5 minute quad of one of the strips I visited. Look in Savannah-Tom-1 album.
tom

Those topos are nice looking. I need to find some way to do the same thing with digital sectional charts.

Those are nice topos. I have been wanting to buy a topo cd and don't know which to buy. National Geographic, DeLorme, or the Garmin CD. The Garmin you can load to you Garmin GPS so that is a real advantage.

One thing I'd like to have is the old maps that show airstrips. If you buy the State Book of TOPO maps that delorme puts out, they show old airstrips, sometimes with names sometimes just a line with no name. This makes me wonder if any of these Topo CD's you can buy have the old airstrips shown. If anyone has any experience with this let me know.

Another thing I have thought Zane. It might be of real interest to have a way that you could upload waypoint data in a format that others could down load into their GPS. I don't know if there is a standard or not. It looks like MapSource files could be shared. With the popularity of Garmin GPS's maybe that would work. I'd love to be able to load all the backcounty airstrips into my 296.

gdafoe wrote:Another thing I have thought Zane. It might be of real interest to have a way that you could upload waypoint data in a format that others could down load into their GPS. I don't know if there is a standard or not. It looks like MapSource files could be shared. With the popularity of Garmin GPS's maybe that would work. I'd love to be able to load all the backcounty airstrips into my 296.

When I get some breathing room from work and get back to working on the airstrip database, that is definitely something I'll include. Great idea.

I'm a happy customer of the National Geographic TOPO series. I've got Oregon, Nevada, Arizona, and Utah. My next purchase will be the California map. Each set is six to eight CDs. You can upload GPS tracks or download waypoints or routes to the GPS. I also tried Delorme topo maps, and it sucked. In fairness to Delorme, it was an early version. Things may be better now, I don't know. The Geographic maps have a waypoint wizard that will import data from spreadsheets or other sources, as well. I downloaded the crash data from some website, and was able to load these points into the map to see what things looked like. Hot spring data from the web is also nice to see on a map. A feature that is handy for flying, is to draw a route on the map, and then have the program run an elevation profile of the route. You can see just what elevation the terrain is all along the route. Most web sellers charge $90 to $100 for each state. You can install the program on a computer, then put all the data maps on the hard drive and get really fast drawing. For travelling, I burn a whole state set of CDs to a single DVD.
tom
ps. I'm only a satisfied National Geographic customer.

Tom,
Have you used the Garmin Map-Source Topos? How do they compare to the National Geographic? I bought the Garmin ones about 2 or 3 years ago when I bought my Etrex Vista, and have been happy with it, however I have been thinking of buying the Nat'l Geo one for printing trail maps for hiking, etc. I use my etrex for everything, from boating, to hiking, to hunting, to flying. It is a quite capable unit, but nothing like a 296 or 396. Will the Nat'l Geo software do what the garmin will do as far as transferring tracks, waypoints, and routes back and forth to the GPS? If so, that might be all the motivation I need to cough up the $$. Thanks

Yes, National Geographic Topo will transfer waypoints, routes, and tracks to and from most GPS units. I've got an old 45 and a 196. Both work great with the program.

Mapsource program from Garmin will actually download map chunks that show up on the screen of your GPS, if it has mapping capability. The National Geographic Topo won't do that. You can get real time mapping with the program if it is running on a portable computer, and the gps is plugged into it.

tom

Looking around, I see some places aren't selling the National Geographic Topo program anymore. Here's the official website for those that want to learn more: http://maps.nationalgeographic.com/topo/state.cfm

I also found another product that sounds very much like the one I like. It is called All Topo Maps. Their website is here:
http://www.alltopo.com/atm2.htm

tom

The major advantage of the Garmin Topos is that you can upload the map sections to your GPS, and see all the features of the map on your screen. The map resolution is not that great though, I think they're 1:100,000 scale.

I think you are right about the Garmin maps. The National Geographic and the All Topo include 1:500000, 1:100000, 1:50000, and 1:24000 maps. The National Geographic also has a palm top version.