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#1
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Any thoughts on Garmin GPSmap 96?
I'm considering buying a GPSmap 96 or 76s as my starter GPS. It will be
used exclusively for soaring, initially, near my home airport of Hollister, CA and later for developing my cross country skills. Does anyone have a GPSmap 96? If so, could you share some thoughts on using it as a navigational aid for soaring? Thanks! |
#2
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Any thoughts on Garmin GPSmap 96?
There is a review at
http://www.flyingmag.com/article.asp...article_id=512 For navigation, it is excellent. Garmin makes reliable, simple to use gps handhelds. The 96 does not tell you many things the soaring pilot wants, like speed to glide. So, do not consider it a flight computer. It does a great job to replace the sectional. |
#3
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Any thoughts on Garmin GPSmap 96?
Nothing against Garmin but....
1) No turnpoint databases. 2) No speed to fly 3) No glide to finish 4) Thermal related details (history, etc) 5) Fairly large as it doesn't fit into the instrument panel. 6) No secure logging so it cannot be used for badges, records and (50/50) for contests. 7) No winds aloft calculation I know that it is a less expensive approach but basically this is a power pilot's GPS, not a soaring pilot's GPS. It will get you from here to there, but won't help you with badges, contests and records. What are the alternatives? I suggest to people to use a Cambridge 302A (302 is much better but more $$$$) and a PDA with Glide Navigator II. That will set you back around $1200-$1500 depending on if you find things used. There is a new GPS and flight recorder coming on the market called the EW Avionics microRecorder. It is $120 less (without sound recording) than the Cambridge 302A and can be used as a standalone recorder with its internal battery. - John |
#4
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Any thoughts on Garmin GPSmap 96?
ContestID67 wrote:
Nothing against Garmin but.... 1) No turnpoint databases. I put waypoints from the turnpoint exchange into my 76S every season. What are you talking about? 2) No speed to fly It's pretty clear the the original poster is just getting started, so I'm not sure how important that is. 3) No glide to finish My 76S gives me glide to any waypoint. I'm not sure where you got that information either. Jeremy |
#5
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Any thoughts on Garmin GPSmap 96?
fbrahic wrote: I'm considering buying a GPSmap 96 or 76s as my starter GPS. It will be used exclusively for soaring, initially, near my home airport of Hollister, CA and later for developing my cross country skills. Does anyone have a GPSmap 96? If so, could you share some thoughts on using it as a navigational aid for soaring? Thanks! If you search on "GPSMAP" in R.A.S., you'll find a number of threads on this topic. To summarize one line of thought, the GPSMAP 76 provides everything you really need for initial XC and limited competition flying (regionals and OLC) for a street price of under $200. From there, you can: a) Interface to your used glide computer (e.g. LNAV, LX, other) if you have one. b) Add a PDA running Winpilot, Glide Navigator, etc. There's a lot of misinformation (such as the posting somewhere in this thread) about what the GPSMAP can't do. Among other cool things, you CAN: - Upload turnpoints, waypoints, landpoints, etc. - Assign different icons to different kinds of points. - Create tasks - Create arrival radius - Log and download flights - Give glide angle to a point - Lots of other stuff that may or may not matter to you However, it doesn't provide speeds to fly and some other important features. It really depends on how much you want to spend; there are some compormises. Regards, Erik Mann LS818 P3 |
#6
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Any thoughts on Garmin GPSmap 96?
I bought one for my father to use in his glider (i also bought one for my
self) and we had a devil of a time getting its NMEA output to work to his EW baraograph, in the end we had to send it back to Garmin in the UK for them to work on it, seems that its a problem with these that Garmin won;t publicly acknowledge but will fix if you badger them enough. Seems that the serial output does not get driven unless it can sense a load on the cable, and the EW doesn't provide enough load to get the signals to be driven...(you can plug a PC serial port in and see the output no problem) they fiddled with my dads system somehow and it works now... I haven't had mine modified, but I also just bought a Lowrence AirMap 600c and it seems to have as good a display if not a little better (bigger), its $100 cheaper and a few more features that can be used by gliders pilots (like acheived instantaneous glide angles and time to impact terrain (which it also knows). it seems a little lower build quality but I think it will work out better... I may be happier with the Lowrence, but I haven't flow with it yet... and I don;t know if it works to the EW either.. I'm in California and my dad is in the Uk where the EW is too :-) ... |
#7
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Any thoughts on Garmin GPSmap 96?
Thanks for all the good advice! I just picked up a slightly used Garmin
96 on ebay for the price of a new 76s, so hopefully that will get me started nicely... Now I just have to learn how to use it. On Nov 28, 11:43 pm, Peter wrote: I bought one for my father to use in his glider (i also bought one for my self) and we had a devil of a time getting its NMEA output to work to his EW baraograph, in the end we had to send it back to Garmin in the UK for them to work on it, seems that its a problem with these that Garmin won;t publicly acknowledge but will fix if you badger them enough. Seems that the serial output does not get driven unless it can sense a load on the cable, and the EW doesn't provide enough load to get the signals to be driven...(you can plug a PC serial port in and see the output no problem) they fiddled with my dads system somehow and it works now... I haven't had mine modified, but I also just bought a Lowrence AirMap 600c and it seems to have as good a display if not a little better (bigger), its $100 cheaper and a few more features that can be used by gliders pilots (like acheived instantaneous glide angles and time to impact terrain (which it also knows). it seems a little lower build quality but I think it will work out better... I may be happier with the Lowrence, but I haven't flow with it yet... and I don;t know if it works to the EW either.. I'm in California and my dad is in the Uk where the EW is too :-) ... |
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