Routes recalculating of their own volition oddity

Wapping

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As a rule I always have my device's 'Off route' recalculation options set to either promoted (where my usual response is 'No') or set to off. This is because I usually prefer to get myself out of trouble and / or back on route. In other words, I prefer not to allow the device to recalculate automatically.

For today's 160 mile ride around north east France, I created a simple A to E route in BaseCamp, where:

A is the start point on the exit road of the Chunnel in France. This is displayed as a green flag

B is an announced waypoint at a cafe in Bolezeel, about an hour from Calais. This is displayed as an orange flag

C is an announced waypoint at a picnic spot in Parenty, about two hours from Bolezeel. This is displayed as an orange flag

D is an announced waypoint at a cafe at Cap Gris Nez. This is displayed as an orange flag

E is the Chunnel entrance in France. This is displayed as a chequered flag.

In between A and E there is the usual set of blue dots, the unannounced shaping points created when I shaped the route in BaseCamp. All very straightforward and simple.

I am pretty confident using Garmin's latest generation devices, knowing that when I'm confronted with a list of destinations A to E I can chose A as I leave the train, pass through it and it'll then pick up the route I created, taking me automaticaly to B, then on to C and D to end at E.

Everything went smoothly until we hit a road closure at a village between A and B ie. between the Chunnel exit and the cafe at Bolezeel. As I couldn't turn left due to a barrier, I went straight on, zooming the map in to find a suitable left / right combination to get myself back onto the magenta line; quite easy. As I expected, the prompt that I was off route flashed up with the question would I like to recalculate, to which I answered, no. Everything was OK..... Until the device recalculated on its own! Not only did it recalculate, it unilaterally decided to miss out waypoint B at Bolezeel and route me to C (the picnic stop) and then back on route to D and E. Rather than stop the ride, I fiddled with the device on the move. I stopped the route, went back into app's, summoned up the route again but only displayed it as a map, I did not start running it. I then navigated myself back onto the route, restarted it and all was well.... back on route to B.

Then there was another detour. Up the prompt came again. Again I said no to the offer to recalculate. Again all was good, until the device again decided to do a recalculation itself, mirroring the result above. Again I stopped the route on the move, opened up the route in the app and navigated myself back onto the magenta line again, then restarted the route. I then arrived at Bolezeel. I checked that the device was definitely set to prompted recalculation, which it was. I then decided to turn recalculation off entirely and rode off, now following the route from B to C.

All was well, until I turned about 10 metres off route to fuel up. On rejoining the route, everything was OK for about two hundred meters, until the device decided I had been off route (which I had by 10 meters into fuel station) and that - despite me now being back on route - it would recalculate it for me.... when, let's not forget, recalculation is turned completely off. Now it routed me not to C but to D and then back onto the route I had created to E.

Rather than stop and knowing I was on the correct route between B and C, I restarted the rote from within the app. All was good again and i trundled along towards C, the device faithfully following the route I had so carefully created, picking off the blue shaping points as I went along. Everything was fine and dandy until.... yup, another diversion.... Again it recalculated of its own volition. Again, it decided to miss out the next waypoint. This time I noticed something new: The screen on its right hand side, normally displays a red cross button to stop the route and above it a dark grey circle button with what I'd call a 'kinked' arrow, allowing the rider to skip a waypoint; both were present. This time I noticed a new light grey button in the lower left hand corner had popped up. It had a reversed curved arrow, like a rewind button. I noticed that this button popped up when the device made its unilateral decission to recalculate for me.... so, lacking anything better to do as I ride along, I pushed it..... BINGO! The device undid its recalculation and what's more brought me back onto route from that point. In short, pushing the light grey button in the lower left hand corner, seems to undo the mischief the device insisted on creating by doing its own unilateral - unasked for - route recalculations.

As the day progressed we had several more detours due to road closures, village fetes and bicycle races. I had several more unwanted and unasked for device generated recalculations, each time sorted by the light grey button.

It's all very odd.

1. Why does the Nav VI do route calculations, when the owner has specifically requested in settings that it shouldn't?

2. Why, when doing the unwanted (and unasked for) recalculation does it seem to miss out the wapoint?

3. Why does a light grey button appear that - when pushed - seems to undo the unwanted route recalculation, returning everything to just as it was, before the unwanted recalculation happened ?

===

Fast forward.... On leaving the Chunnel, I asked the device to take me home ie. create for itself a route A (Chunnel exit) to B (home). This it did. Halfway along, I deliberately went off route, to see what would happen. Remember, I have auto-recalaculation set to off. If the device behaved as it did with the A to E route, it should recalculate of its own volition... It didn't. It simply let me ride my chosen way whilst the magenta line slowly vanished away behind me.

Odd again...

1. The unprompted recalculation only seems to happen when there are waypoints between the start and end points of a route.

2. I think that had I created my French route to be A (Chunnel exit in France) to B (Chunnel entrance in France) with Bolezeel, the Parenty picnic stop and the Cap Gris Nez stop being shaping points and not waypoints, I am 99% certain no recalculation would have occurred, no matter how many times I went off route.

===

(a) I cannot think why the unasked for forced recalculation is occurring.

(b) I cannot think why the forced recalculation misses out the next waypoint.

So I'll ask Garmin and hopefully BMW (as it's their branded device) to explain why.

Other than that, the device behaved itself swimmingly well!





Route file attached.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/fpildqjgq...is - Parenty - Cap Gris Nez - Calais.GPX?dl=0
 
Nothing odd about your route file Richard, all looks good i did notice you had a couple of your caffe stops set to not announce but thats about it.
A bit of a bugger that it recalculates even when switched to dont, at least it seems there is an icon to put it all back to good.
 
Hi Lee, thanks for checking out the route file. Yes, you are spot on; the announced stops are the stopping points (B, C and D) I wanted to use. It is indeed:

1. The device's demand that it makes forced recalculations when the rider goes off-route (for whatever reasons) when it's been told not to recalculate

2. That, when doing so, it seems to miss out the next waypoint

That's troubling me.

Announced waypoints can have a very useful function in routes. Equally, an owner's ability to plot their own routes to take (as oppposed to having a machine do it for them) is a useful function, too. Why else does BaseCamp or Mapsource exist? Why else allow owners to chose between announced and unannounced points when creating their own routes?

When riding any self-created route much longer than say 50 miles, there is a good chance a rider will deviate from the magenta line at some point or another. Whether this is to get fuel, buy a sandwich, take a look at something, being diverted or because they have just made a mistake, makes no odds. To have the device then insist on recalcuting their route (altering it significantly) - when it's been instructed not to - is just wrong.

One thing I noticed but cannot now recall when it happened, is that the blue banner bar at the top of the screen that gives the road details, turned orange at some points. I think this was when the device sensed I was off route or when it made the forced recalculation. I was so busy trying to watch the road, traffic and what the device was doing, that I forget exactly when and why the orange bar appeared.

In the owner's handbook I can find reference to:

Navigating to Skipped Waypoints

By default, your device skips waypoints automatically as you pass them. If you did not intend to skip a waypoint, you can navigate to a waypoint that has been skipped automatically.
From the map, select...

This is the grey button that pops up. My frustration is that I didn't skip the waypoint, not least as I hadn't yet arrived anywhere near it. The device skipped it out for me when it made forced recalculations; recalculations to my pre-planned routes that I had instructed the device not to make.
 
Could not agree more, if you have a route that you have made and wish to stick to it as much as possible unless as you did and encounter diversions, the last thing you want is it recalculating and sending you who knows where.
I think we pretty much do the same when having to deviate from route, and thats just zoom out until you can see the purple line and then make your own way back to it, its always worked for me.
As you say maybe a word with garmin and see what they say.
 
For what it's worth, my Nav V (running the identical route) as loaned to Charlie (ChasMill) on the same jaunt, performed perfectly.
 
On the phone to Garmin as we speak.....

They are at a loss to understand why things are happening as they are. Their honest belief is that it's a software issue.

They have logged it to 'escalate' up the Garmin chain. They have asked that I try running a route from A to E (where B, C and D are waypoints) going off-route deliberately but with one altered setting: Switching the device from fastest time to most direct. That is only to see if the phenomenon occurres then, too.

They have also asked that I try making B, C and D unannounced shaping points, to see what difference if any that makes.

===

Garmin / I would be interested to hear if anyone else has the SAME problem with the Navigator Six ONLY. Ping up your experience here please, as exactly as possible.

Remember we are talking about forced route recalculation issues, when the Navigator Six is set to NO recalculation or when NO is chosen as an answer to the "Off route, recalculate" prompt. In other words, when the Nav Six device does a recalculation of its own volition when it's been instructed not to and then, what the results were.

The more clear details you can give the better, please.

Thank you.

Richard
 
In the interest of helping Garmin and maybe bikermates along the way, i've spent a happy couple of hours in London traffic trying out various scenarios on my Nav Six.

1. Route A to E where B, C and D are announced waypoints (orange flags) separated by unannounced shaping points to create one route

2. The same A to E, but where the three announced waypoints have been converted into unannounced shaping points

3. A to E direct with no shaping points at all

I worked all three versions in prompted recalculation mode (always said no) and with recalculation turned off completely. I also tried them in fastest time and in most direct modes The results were always the same, which were as follows:

(a) If there was an announced waypoint in the route then a recalculation would always take place, irrespective of whether the device's recalculation preference was set to off or if 'no' was selected when prompted as to whether to recalculate or not.

(b) Sometimes the recalculation was fundamental, completely altering the pre-planned route to some degree or another.

(c) During the forced device induced recalculation process, which always seemed to start a minute or so after the first notice of being off route was given, the blue information bar at the top of the screen turned orange and the device counted down the list of all the waypoints, each flashing up briefly in the orange bar. When the recalculation was complete and the revised route displayed, the orange bar reverted back to its regular blue colour, functioning normally. During the orange bar phase, the grey 'rewind' button appeared in the bottom left hand quarter of the screen but vanished away again as soon as the bar reverted back to blue.

(d) Continuously driving off route eventually forced the device to stop recalculating. The device became so apparently overwhelmed that it refused to acknowledge my arrival at the end of the route's chequered flag, even though my car was sitting right on top of it. In short, it kept the route running. I eventually had to stop the route manually, using the red cross 'stop route' button.

(e) Changing all the waypoints to unannounced shaping points still prompted a notice that I was off-route but no recalculation took place, ever. This is normal.

(f) Changing the route to be A to E, with nothing at all between by way of shaping or waypoints, still prompted an off-route warning but no recalculation. This is normal.

I did not get an opportunity to try the 'rewind' button, as I was too busy driving in London's dense traffic, whilst fiddling with the device's screen and my camera phone.

My conclusions are:

1. If there are waypoints in a route and you go off route before you reach them, the Nav Six device will make a recalculation of its own volition, irrespective of whether it has been instructed not to recalculate or not.

2. Sometimes the recalculated route offered up can be fundamentally different to that which you created in BaseCamp, up to and including it missing out a waypoint. What criteria the device uses to create the revised route I can't work out; at least not from yesterday's or tonight's activities.

3. After missing out a waypoint, the Nav Six device will rejoin your created route at some point; you can see the little blue dots and distant orange flags displayed if you zoom the map out. Quite where and how it does this exactly I am not sure.... There is only so much looking at (and fiddling with) the GPS screen you can do in central London traffic, all whilst taking pictures with your phone... I know, it's vey bad and I will probably go to Hell.

4. If there are no waypoints in the route (it's A to B) or if any waypoints are simply all unannounced shaping points, no forced - device initiated, of its own volition - recalculation will take place. You can simply request a recalculation or just navigate yourself back onto your route. The latter method gets my vote, as at least you'll know that you'll be rejoining the route YOU (and not the device) created.

I'll let Garmin know, letting them have the route and track files, too.
 
A and D in your first list would seem wrong to me, you have told the nav not to recalculate or asked to prompt to recalculate, and it ignores this. And in D i can understand why this would happen but still it should not.
 
Indeed, I am at a loss to understand why the device ignores a direct instruction or order not to recalculate.

I am also at a loss to understand why the device's wilful disregard of the command not to recalculate only applies if there is a an active waypoint (or waypoints) in the route. I am though happy that - when there is no waypoint in the route - no recalculation will take place.
 
I can't add anything other than I experienced a similar problem riding back from the Isle of Wight a few days ago, and the week before on the way back home from Inverness. I had told it not to recalculate as I often see or think of a quick divert on the fly to to speak. Coming from the Isle of Wight I'd plotted a route back up toe Warrington, taking a more scenic route for the Southern part of the journey, but decided to pope into Eastleigh to see an old friend, I had to double check I'd got recalculate disabled, I had, and it was still complaining all the way into and around Eastleigh.

At Inverness, I had a route that I usually use, but decided I'd detour slightly for a coffee in Ballater, again recalculate disabled and it was constantly trying to get me back on route. It's possible that it was an active waypoint dropping me down to Balmoral that was causing that however.

I'd suspect it is just as you suggest, a software bug, so hopefully they will get this ironed out in the next firmware release.

I'm also hoping Garmin address a point I've raised in that the Nav VI has all this whizzy stuff for communicating with the iPhone and streaming music, but in a K1600 with Audio it insists you use the bikes audio system. Not relevant to this topic, but I'll feedback what Garmin say about potentially overriding this.
 
Could it be that it recalculates because it can find a quicker/faster (depending on your setting) method of rejoining the route?
 
But, as Wapping has stated, in doing so it is missing out the "next" waypoint and waypoints are 'must visit' points
 
I could understand this type of recalculation if there were no must do way points, but to recalculate when not asked to, and then miss a must do waypoint is just not right IMHO, i would think as long as you are aware of this its not so much of an issue, and maybe its just a bit of faulty programing that may get fixed with an update, time will tell.
 
This really sounds like a case of "nanny knows best" Garmin don't trust us to be out on our own!

John
 
Just to keep bods up-to-date.

I haven't forgotten about this, I just haven't had a chance to speak to Garmin again yet. I will though.

I have though been thinking about the problem.

1. Like post #13, I still don't think that the device should ever recalculate a route if it's been specifically instructed not to do so. This is particularly true if the route has been created by the device's owner to take him down the roads he (and not the device) wants to ride.

2. For people - and there are lots - that just allow Garmin to create all their routes for them, it probably doesn't matter too much. Indeed they need the device to always recalculate for them, or they'd never get anywhere.

3. I have no problem with the latest Garmin software having the ability to skip waypoints. But only if the device's owner has instructed the device to carry out the 'skip waypoint' action. Having it skip waypoints due to a forced (and unwanted) recalculation, isn't right.

4. But, having said that and with half an eye on post #14, I am half starting to wonder if Garmin's latest recalculation ability is perhaps now cleverer than I perhaps thought? Maybe I should now have recalculation permanently on? Maybe it's now so good that it will always get me back onto my pre-planned route just as quickly as it can? Only time and experience gained from using it and experimenting will tell.
 
but will just recalculate to get you back on route plotted or recalculate a different route to the destination?
 
Had the same trouble in scotland last week had a 270mile route planned from pitlochery to ullapool. We missed a junction by 100yards unit recalculated the fastest route to ullapool! Pulled into a petrol station at Tore and it set route to fastest ullapool again. To get the planned route back on the unit had to be on the road that was on the route.

Sent from my SM-G950F using Tapatalk
 
Thank you, tuckerhauser.

Just so I know, was your device set to / instructed to:

'Do NOT recalculate' but it still did.
 
Had the same trouble in scotland last week had a 270mile route planned from pitlochery to ullapool. We missed a junction by 100yards unit recalculated the fastest route to ullapool! Pulled into a petrol station at Tore and it set route to fastest ullapool again. To get the planned route back on the unit had to be on the road that was on the route.

Sent from my SM-G950F using Tapatalk
I created my route in the "myroute-app" had waypoints on route but not waypoints to stop at.
When I transferred to unit was all straight lines so I used the track to route option. This removed all my waypoints and just left me with start and end points

Guess this is why it was always rerouting direct to the final destination.
Least i could tell when it 're calculated as the arrival mileage dropped massively & plus I knew the route without the sat nav.
Was just testing the unit out

Sent from my SM-G950F using Tapatalk
 


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