what should I look for when buying one of these gismos? It needs to cover UK & Ireland.
Would you be going for a route finder Splinters, or a SatNav with the whole package?
Have a look at this link, Splinters. There is a fair bit of reading there, but it covers most of the options.
You could also put Tom Tom or Sat Nav into the search option at the top of the page, any page.
i stick to maps myself, more fun and keeps it interesting 
kindle530:
i stick to maps myself, more fun and keeps it interesting
Only coz the boss pays for em, think he would have an epy if you came back an bought a sat nav with the running money
Thanks for the links but I think the tom tom doesn,t cover Ireland. It certainly looks the business though.What,s next best to a tom tom ?
Biggles, 95% of my maps are mine, but it would be worth it to see the look on Mr.M"s face if i came home with hardly any diesel and a sat nav instead !! he"d want it 4 himself for all those miles he does every week 
There was something about sat nav in Ireland in there. There are several different systems, but only one that has decent coverage of Ireland. Can’t remember which one though.
I use the BMW Navigator 2 (a thinly disguised version of the Garmin 6210, I think). Yes the BMW kit is expensive; it includes a mounting cradle for the bike and a dash kit with 12/24v power supply and speaker for just about any other vehicle. The Garmin map base covers everything from the west coast of Ireland through to the Polish / German border and from Northern coast of Norway to Southern Sicilly. Cannot say how good the map for Ireland is but I’ve not had a problem in Britain, France, Germany, Belgium or Spain.
One extra you might consider is the repeater ariel for truck use, as some cabs don’t allow the unit to ‘see’ satallites properly. The Garmin only does a 2d view of the road, unlike the TomTom 3d, but I haven’t found this a disadvantage.
There is also the Garmin Street Finder 3, similar to the updates 2610 but with a slower processor, also takes a smaller memory card. To give you an idea, I’ve copied the whole of europe as described above onto a single 1 Gb cf card, now I don’t care where I get sent.
i have over £400 ■■■■■■■ in my own maps. i wont use gps at all. i feel that map-reading is one of the skills in this job
here here scanny. i think in the years to come, map reading will go the same way as roping and sheeting! people refusing to go up the road if all they got is a load of maps and no gps
splinters ireland isnt really well covered on digital mapping the best one i can think of that suppports ireland well is alks copoilt 5 im not sure but the navman icn serries should do it ok to as i think they use navteq mapping which is what copilot uses
kindle530:
here here scanny. i think in the years to come, map reading will go the same way as roping and sheeting! people refusing to go up the road if all they got is a load of maps and no gps
I too have maps, but they take up an enormous amount of cabspace, and still don’t cover half of the places I need to go. Plus, most of the ones I bought in the early days are virtually useless- I recently got to the end of my tether with a 1987 A-Z of Birmingham which seemed to bear no relation whatsoever to the Birmingham I was trying to navigate my way around, and bought a new one.
But that wasn’t cheap, and I imagine it would cost more to replace all of my maps with “treeware” versions than with some SatNav device…
It’s only the initial price, and my innate meanness which puts me off of SatNav, but you can bet your life that it will go the same way as mobile phones- in a few years they will be so cheap that kids have them on their bikes.
Then, certainly, I would get one- for cabspace considerations if nothing else.
Vince
Vince:
Then, certainly, I would get one- for cabspace considerations if nothing else.
That is the reason I ditched my maps and started using route finders and Sat Nav, maps just take up way too much space.
Must be 4 years since I had a paper map in the cab but that doesn’t mean I’ve forgotten how to read a map. 
splinters:
Thanks for the links but I think the tom tom doesn,t cover Ireland. It certainly looks the business though.What,s next best to a tom tom ?
There is an Irish version! When you programme the destination it calculates a route and tells you,
“To be sure, if you want to get there I wouldn’t start from here” 
Wheel Nut:
There is an Irish version! When you programme the destination it calculates a route and tells you,“To be sure, if you want to get there I wouldn’t start from here”
The Irish Version also needs a couple of pieces of Vital Info to help it Calculate the ETA
The GPS will start asking instructions by saying Quote “Would that be yourself programming the information” to which the only acceptable reply is, Quote “Wait until I check myself in the Mirror”
It then needs to know
(A) Type of Wellingtons ? (Something to do with type of tread)
(B) Length of string between the Wellies (so it can measure the paces)
PLEASE NOTE: This posting in no way reflects a bad opinion of the Irish and is only meant to be taken in Humour “To be sure”
anyone know if there’s one that covers the US and Canada?
Plenty Alli, most of the manufacturers do one that covers US and Canada.
what do you do when it falis? it can happen as you all know. using maps, the only thing i have to do is keep them dry, clean and up to date with a pen
Hi Scanny,
well I carry one road atlas - which would get me to the town or area - I would then have to buy a map. There is of course always the possibility of this happening - but it is so much easier the rest of the time not having to keep checking maps. The idea of working out a route thru a town, then missing a turning and so either having to turn back or re-plan is a nightmare compared to a sat nav. If I miss a turn, it just calculates a new route in 10-15 seconds.
So in balance, a SatNav is worth its weight in gold - come to think of it, I think thats what I paid for mine 
(I use a TomTom Go.)