Virtual Geocache "or unit comparison" that you can try from home.

[Glanceblamm]

I have been to the North Pole (virtually of course) with this experience being too harrowing and over the top to try and describe in a post. In short, I did not think that I was going to be able to escape from this place! To elaborate just a little, the distance display on both units was a life saver as I felt that nothing else could really be counted on unless it would be the wind, or the sun, on the side of ones face.

 I did share this experience with one very knowledgeable member here via pm and liked his thought that there may be Jeppson databases and small clusters (read ice stations) available for those who do research or travel in this area whether it be above the ice pack, or below such as in the case of submarines.

I have been to the South Pole also. This was a much easier task but I did encounter some of the same navigation problems such as shifting lines and pixel freeze on my two units that were similar to my experience up north.

THE VIRTUAL GEOCACHE
If nothing else, I figured that the above would be a good chance for us to compare our units accuracy, or at least see how the different brands compare against each other. We are going to the max here.

INSTRUCTIONS
Create waypoint  N89 00.000  E000 00.000 and call it North
Create waypoint S89 00.000   E000 00.000 and call it South

Note: If you have a problem with this format, “say decimal degrees verse decimal minuets” you will have too umm…See Siskiyou for a conversion

You are also going to need the waypoint from your residence as your units mileage display may not exceed four digits and we are talking five here. It will also be worth measuring from your home to see what your unit reads “degree wise” in either direction. I might be wrong but think that all units will measure roughly the same degree's to north & south from most anywhere?

MY Results
I read North as being 3,473 miles away @ 2degrees and South as being 8,955 miles away @ 180degrees. I add these two numbers then multiply x 2 to get 24,856 miles.

THE CONTROL
I am using Google for the control here “googling earth+diameter”. I chose pole to pole of course and it claims 24,859 miles so I was off by 3 miles. The “control” really is not that important as we are mainly comparing our units against each other.

Virtual Geocache anyone?

Edit: Mine is an older Garmin GPS 12

[str8shooter48]

Well I gave a shot. I tried it on my  Garmin Oregon 300 first. Then my Garmin 60csx.
Here's what I come up with from my location.

Oregon 300: North 3324miles  South 9241 miles x2 for a total of 25130 miles.

60csx: North 3324 South 9241 miles x2  for a total of 25130 miles.

Both units read identical mileage.

[str8shooter48]

Well I gave a shot. I tried it on my  Garmin Oregon 300 first. Then my Garmin 60csx.
Here's what I come up with from my location.

Oregon 300: North 3324miles  South 9241 miles x2 for a total of 25130 miles.

60csx: North 3324 South 9241 miles x2  for a total of 25130 miles.

Both units read identical mileage.

Well just for the fun of it I got out the old Garmin Nuvi 350. punched in the coords and got the same mileage reading. I guess all three of my units coincide with each other, to the mile anyway.

[Glanceblamm]

Three to one (in favor of str8shooter48) and from a statistical standpointpoint would suggest that my unit is awry over the distance before multiplying which was 12,428 miles in my case.

I did fire my unit back up to check for a typo error but have to stand pat @ 24,856 miles.

Need more data people

[str8shooter48]

Now this is strange. This morning I took these readings.

Oregon 300: North 3324miles  South 9241 miles x2 for a total of 25130 miles.

60csx: North 3324 South 9241 miles x2  for a total of 25130 miles.

Tonight I fired up the Oregon 300 again  used the same coords as directed and this is what I come up with.

 North 3243 miles  South 9159 =12402 X2 =24802

I'm going to check again tommorow

[str8shooter48]

You know it sucks getting old. Found a mind fart from yesterday morning. When all three of my units showed dramatically higher number than yours I figured out why this morning. I was typing in the wrong coords for the longitude my mistake (e089 00.000) Duh.

Last night when I redid it with the Oregon using the right coords and came up with a reading much closer to yours. Not exactly but much closer, I decided to get the 60csx and it verified it. Yep I messed up

Now both get a mileage of: North 3243 miles  South 9159 milles =12402 X2 =24802

[Glanceblamm]

You know it sucks getting old. Found a mind fart from yesterday morning.

Had this happen myself yesterday afternoon but did not get a chance to work with it until today. The error that I found mainly had to do with my so called CONTROL.

If we draw a line from 89N To 89S, this still leaves 69 miles on either side to reach either pole...At least that is what my mapping software figured when I ran it. I also found that when comparing a single number from two different units and then trying to multiply x 2 the error increases greatly. Kind of confusing but if you take 100 and 150 (obviously 50 apart) then multiply x 2, they then increase to being apart by a 100 count. Pretty big error when you get in the 24k mile range, Duh, send me back to practical math for suggesting the multiplication.

WE ARE STILL OK but should only record the numbers over the actual distance, I need to edit the control completely out of the first post but will let it ride for now.

My Reading: 3,473 to North (@2degrees) and 8,955 to South (@180degree) =12,428 miles

Your Reading: of North 3243 miles & South 9159 miles =12,402 miles

Now thats more like it!...Maybe not real good with a six mile difference but there is still that factor of measuring from ones residence that I originally thought might not matter. What was your degree's N & degree's S ?

[str8shooter48]

Well if I'm using the unit properly here is what I got.

North 3243 miles @ 1°

South 9159 miles @ 179°