I use my iphone with Tomtom software as my gps. It's a great setup with the sound output wired to my autocom. The only problem is not being able to control it while riding due to wearing gloves.
Saw on another forum that you could use conductive thread to make a glove work and managed to source a couple of meters to try it out. The idea is to have a reasonable surface area for your fingers to touch the thread and a small contact patch to not confuse the iphone screen.
Obviously this wouldn't be a good idea with waterproof gloves as you'd bugger up the waterproofing but as I've just fitted a set of tucano muffs I'm riding in my unlined summer gloves pretty much all the time now.
I turned the index finger inside out, and ran some stitching just through the surface of the leather under the tip of my finger,
then up over the top and made a larger pad above the finger where the lining is, as there's no lining under the fingers.
I then ran a couple of stitches through the very tip of the glove, tied off and turned it back out again. Problem was I'd been so neat there wasn't enough thread showing to contact the screen so I ran another piece through the stitches in the gap and then made a few small stitched at the tip on the outside. Tied off again and this time it works.
Obviously you have to be reasonably precise about where you put your finger to hit the buttons so the small contact patch is ideal, just takes a bit of getting used to.
I don't plan to do much button pushing on the move but if a text comes in you want to be able to hit the 'dismiss' button otherwise it sits there covering the map, and if you need to make a change it mean you can do so without pulling over to take you gloves off.
Will see how it works in practice but it seems ok. Yes, I know a zumo would be better and eventually I'll get one as you can't upload routes to the tomtom. However, I already had an iphone and the tomtom software was 'ahem' cheap. Given that I've only been working for the past month after a year unemployed this is a cheap way to try out satnav on the bike.
Cheers,
J.
Saw on another forum that you could use conductive thread to make a glove work and managed to source a couple of meters to try it out. The idea is to have a reasonable surface area for your fingers to touch the thread and a small contact patch to not confuse the iphone screen.
Obviously this wouldn't be a good idea with waterproof gloves as you'd bugger up the waterproofing but as I've just fitted a set of tucano muffs I'm riding in my unlined summer gloves pretty much all the time now.
I turned the index finger inside out, and ran some stitching just through the surface of the leather under the tip of my finger,
then up over the top and made a larger pad above the finger where the lining is, as there's no lining under the fingers.
I then ran a couple of stitches through the very tip of the glove, tied off and turned it back out again. Problem was I'd been so neat there wasn't enough thread showing to contact the screen so I ran another piece through the stitches in the gap and then made a few small stitched at the tip on the outside. Tied off again and this time it works.
Obviously you have to be reasonably precise about where you put your finger to hit the buttons so the small contact patch is ideal, just takes a bit of getting used to.
I don't plan to do much button pushing on the move but if a text comes in you want to be able to hit the 'dismiss' button otherwise it sits there covering the map, and if you need to make a change it mean you can do so without pulling over to take you gloves off.
Will see how it works in practice but it seems ok. Yes, I know a zumo would be better and eventually I'll get one as you can't upload routes to the tomtom. However, I already had an iphone and the tomtom software was 'ahem' cheap. Given that I've only been working for the past month after a year unemployed this is a cheap way to try out satnav on the bike.
Cheers,
J.
