Looking to get a driving job soon and there is always some places you drive to and are not sure of your way around.
Do any drivers use these portable sat nav systems ie Tom Tom or Garmin systems? looking for one which is good for the UK
Any recommendations or advice
Thank you
motoman:
Looking to get a driving job soon and there is always some places you drive to and are not sure of your way around.
Do any drivers use these portable sat nav systems ie Tom Tom or Garmin systems? looking for one which is good for the UKAny recommendations or advice
Thank you
I’ve used the tom tom in the past and found it very easy to use. I’ve currently got co-pilot on a pda phone and don’t find that so easy.
The thing to remember with sat nav is to use it in conjunction with the mk1 eyeball. There are a number of stories on here of muppets who have blindly followed their satnav and got stuck etc
SEMTEX
I know what you mean, just think it would help when the going gets abit heavy. Like most “gadgets” they do not aways get it right as my boss found out today with his non updateable sat nav system…
Hi Motoman,
I have the TomTom home edition that my kids bought me for Christmas.
Used in anger for the first time last Saturday, whilst delivering to Spar shops in Nunneaton, Rugby and Coventry (Not areas that I am familiier with).
I was well impress that it took me straight to the front door of each shop (even though most of the deliveries were round the back 
).
As Semtex says, you do have to use a degree of nounce when using in a lorry and not just follow the directions as you would in a car, there were a couple of times when leaving one shop to go to another that it tried to turn me around in a housing estate with a few tight turns in order to position the vehicle in the right direction, rather than simply go to the next roundabout.
Ian.
There are lots on the market whilst I have never used a Tom Tom and I believe that they are pretty good I have a Navman F20 cheap and cheerfull and does what it says on the tin… in that as long as you use common sense then you wont go far wrong…Sat navs presume you a car and can make a u turn on a sixpence or go down a housing estate were the road is 6ft wide 
Also get a good set of maps as back up
Apparantly some Garmin systems will allow you to block a section of road permanently (ie until you unblock it).
So for example you could get the system to calculate your route and then inspect it to see if it clashes with any low bridge poi data. If it does, you can then block that section of road and the satnav will route around it.
Next time you travel that route the system should do this for you automatically, so you should only ever need to input the block once.
I’m not sure if any other systems have this feature but this would be pretty high on my list for an LGV sat nav system.
I believe that Garmin also use Navteq mapping software, and Navteq are apparantly planning to release LGV specific mapping data later his year, which might even stop the need for such poi files / blocking / etc.
Tom Tom for me, never got me wrong yet. As Semtex says though you still have to use your loaf /eyes as it should only be used as a guide and doesnt cover weight/height/width limits.
TomTom are the market leader and, IMHO, they deserve to be there. They’ve got the combination of good-quality maps, good GPS signal quality, reasonable routing, and above all, a well designed user interface.
You can certainly put in roadblocks on TomTom, although whether they’re permanent, I’m not sure.