sorry! can't edit here after 1 hour... otherwise i'd have deleted 9/10ths of my posts due to excessive alcoholic influence!
Absolutely! That was one thing that I knew would end up being a problem. Waz supplied a Terraphone beforehand but installation time was lacking, I followed up on a Sparco 9V system so as not to sabotage the cars' original wiring, but it was nil stock two days before the event. This was one of the reasons why I was fairly quiet in the car initially, I just didn't want to give any mixed messages which end up as the car getting bent, so it was all various hand signals, which in hindsight would likely have been fairly useless when trying to indicate an opening or tightening hairpin, or that the road drops. Probably the only time they may have been useful was indicating which way the road went over the crest, but again a distraction to the driver. For instance over the Mt Lofty flying finish crest, which I know very well, my shouted message was "Caution, crest, straight on" but that would likely have never been heard . Another thing would be a resettable odo/GPS. Probably in addition of doing a recce beforehand I should also have invested in another GPS unit. The one on board being used to monitor the excellent fuel economy of the car in order to get a baseline with the car being new and economy unknown. However those couple of things would not have helped the couple or three brainfades on the transports which hadn't been recce'd by me. One other thing that would be useful is a footplate for the nav. As it was the setup turned out to be perfect for me, but someone with longer legs would end up potentially putting stress on the battery/bracket, or someone with shorter legs would be left feeling insecure. A footrest would keep the battery and nav happy.
i finally got my bluetooth gps today, it's sooooo cute! so either way between me and Alex by next year's classic there will be a killer rally nav system available....
mm beware, not all GPS the same. I tested 2 units on rally, "old faithful" and new lightweight one.. the little one didn't handle windy stuff in gorge and lost track several times.. and didn't even get any signal at all on plane on way over.. compared to my other one which, once locked on, is like a terrier and handles plane trips at 950 km/h easily.. Bluetooth is convenient, I use (yet another) one in-car atm for nav testing on handheld but is another thing to remember to charge, or have hooked up, and of course there's the whole wireless thing which is another link in the chain to break.. On top of that all those units are 1 hz systems which is once per sec, plenty ok for most street and some comp apps but I prefer rugged reliability and simplicity of USB GPS which handles power and comms all in one as well as ability to configure for higher rates to feed the software.. There are all sorts of things that sound like they'll do the job but in practice you need to know not all the same..
yeah i already have an old garmin, i wanted a bluetooth to make it easier for my testing stuff and to use with my phone, it's like a matchbox so not a pain to carry around with me. final mounted in-car stuff would likely end up being wired up to the batt, usb connected, and have an external antenna.
Have fully operational system already.. aim to be down there for trials and testing of GPS as well as mobile coverage as have a few different things going with people down there.. So depends on what you want packaged for you and how detailed or whether doing your own recce?.. sounds like your from Tas?
Excuse my momentary diversion - what model is it? I've been looking around without any special urgency, just out of interest in playing with'em really - but small and BT is perfect for what I want.
gps in a plane is very handy, if the pilot dont know where he is going heaven help the rest of the plane
Moretti, what was it you said to me ages ago when we were talking about the inertial nav systems in F-111s? "GPS only tells the pilot where he is going to crash" or something like that Moderetti, not afraid to tell it like it is
royaltek rbt-1000... haven't managed to get it to pick up any satellites in my little bit of playing with it yet tho.... :/ about $90 bucks delivered http://cgi.ebay.com.au/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ih=016&sspagename=STRK%3AMEWN%3AIT&viewitem=&item=260047807328&rd=1&rd=1
i quite liked my last trip to melbourne on virgin blue, had a spare seat next to me and so tuned into the stats channel on the headrest, continually shows the position, speed, altitude etc of the plane. also very cool for when you're travelling along peering out the window wondering what town that is down there... look at the gps readout and you can see!
Yeah it's always fascinating to see where you are, how far to go etc.. makes for interesting app when using with street mapping software to see you doing 950 across the landscape and what that looks like! On flight up north couple months ago showed bunch load of kids in sports team and had plenty of "wows" etc.. also solves the "are we there yet.." ;-)
I'm using 4 different GPS using at the moment and recently picked up Royaltek and using with O2 Atom handheld and Tom Tom software and seems to work in-car just fine.. only dropped out once in middle of using but not enough info to know to know what prob was, BT, PDA Software etc but on/off of both units got back "on track".. so far so good.. OT: One of the things I enjoy is stressing the software out and see what it does, eg on long stretch of expressway and then select "avoid motorway" when setting new route. On way home from from airport after Classic Adelaide I chose "bicycle route" while on the expressway.. the unit then directed me to take "sharp left" AGAINST oncoming traffic coming on from an on-ramp.. I guess they figure if you're on a bicycle you're capable of doing just about anything ;-) Other oddities are possible to, eg set an impossible desired time it lets you enter to be at your destination.. I don't think the courts allow 200 average just because your GPS says thats what you need to do... lol
You'll find some probs with mobile ph coverage on some of the stages. Some will pick up nothing, others will pick up CDMA and others will pick up both. Give me a shout when you're coming down and we can talk about what you have available on offer. Always do my own recce and used to do my own notes but found it better buying professionally prepared notes and just checking them off. If I can help out with anything down here, let me know.
Yes - fully expecting gaps in mobile coverage so part of it will be to see how much as we are testing realtime posn updating to the net using off the shelf comms and assessing performance of both network as well as GPS. Couldn't agree more on the self-recce on top of prof notes. Based on Adelaide last week I'd *add* some stuff that affects you such as divided road coming up and *delete/ignore* some overly detailed stuff like sequence of 10L 10R 10L S bends where sighted to end and just want to know what to expect at end and so on.. In one stage we came screaming through we came around bend and suddenly confronted with wall to wall flock of emus in middle of the road.. so need to add "wildlife" caution too perhaps ;-).. either that or bull bar or "shoo-roo" lol Will definitely look you up and let you know dates when all confirmed..
Yep, always pays to go over the course checking notes. In particular, even when general conditions are dry, there are some bends/corners that don't see the sun and consequently are damp/wet....nothing worse that hitting one of these when you expected it to be dry. Look forward to catching up.
Awesome pics there guys! Looks like a really great event. Any chance we can get the shots of Goobs getting some air and MHH burning rubber in Hi-res please?
when i get CD will then distribute, all i have now is scanned pics. but u can buy the only shot on ebay of a ferrari flying
I can just picture the new decals....volare racing ...perhaps add GTB EDIT: maybe dub the Dean Martin song onto the disc
