Multiple routes on mapsource

[talljohn]

Can anyone advise me how I can add multiple routes onto mapsource (on PC) at the same time. I want to add several (piste) routes and then join them together, but I can only add and view one route at a time. Is this a limitation or am i missing something.

 

[richie]

Can anyone advise me how I can add multiple routes onto mapsource (on PC) at the same time. I want to add several (piste) routes and then join them together, but I can only add and view one route at a time. Is this a limitation or am i missing something.

You can add as many routes as you like, however AFAIK you cannot merge them together. In anycase I prefer the opposite, make short sections for a days ride, ride each section and start the next one. It removes the problems when half way through a days route the GPS fecks up... Just my experience, I am using a NUVI 550 BTW

 

[Bumpkin]

Using the route tool define your route start and end points, then press the 'Esc' key and use the selection tool to modify your route to your liking. To start a new route select the route tool again and do the same for the next route.

Either that or open a 2nd instance of Mapsource, create your route and then right click the route in the left pane and Copy the route before pasting it into another instance of Mapsource with your other routes.

Not sure what the limitation is but I've had the whole of a two week tour with each day as a route plus a few contingency routes in there as well with no problems. As above, max route length being one days ride or even break it up into morning and afternoon.

 

[cookie]

In anycase I prefer the opposite, make short sections for a days ride, ride each section and start the next one.

me too

 

[Rasher]

Using the route tool define your route start and end points, then press the 'Esc' key and use the selection tool to modify your route to your liking. To start a new route select the route tool again and do the same for the next route.

Either that or open a 2nd instance of Mapsource, create your route and then right click the route in the left pane and Copy the route before pasting it into another instance of Mapsource with your other routes.

Not sure what the limitation is but I've had the whole of a two week tour with each day as a route plus a few contingency routes in there as well with no problems. As above, max route length being one days ride or even break it up into morning and afternoon.

I know people who keep a "Master" file with all the routes they have ever done using copy and paste, you can certainly store loads.

Most units will only take so many at once, you can upload the lot to memory card, but for example mine only holds ten routes, so after a few days I have to delete the old ones and import the new.

 

[Wapping]

Can anyone advise me how I can add multiple routes onto mapsource (on PC) at the same time. I want to add several (piste) routes and then join them together, but I can only add and view one route at a time. Is this a limitation or am i missing something.

1. Open the Mapsource file you want to copy the route or track from. We will call this A.

2. In the box on the left, highlight (right click) the route or track and select 'copy'

3. Open Mapsource again in a second window. We will call this B.

4. Right click in the box on the left and select 'paste'. The copied item will now appear.

5. Return to your first Mapsouce file A and now open up the second route you wish to copy.

6. Copy second route.

7. Return to B and paste.

8. You should now have two routes in B.

9. Repeat as necessary.

======

You can now start manipulating the routes or tracks around, snipping bits out, tracing over them, playing with the route selection tool, using the rubber and all sorts of other fun and games.

Play around with it as it is the only way to learn and, as you are only using copies, impossible to break.

 

[Bumpkin]

for example mine only holds ten routes

It's odd that isn't it, the older units such as my StreetPilot 2720 can hold 50 routes for immediate access, the Zumo 550 is the same, yet the later Zumo 660 can only have 20, the Zumo 220 and Nuvi 550 can only hold 10.

Whilst I know that you can have others on an SD card ready for import I can't see why they've done that

Whilst 20 is enough for a two week trip with the last two above I'd be either having to load from an SD card, toting my netbook or joining days into single routes. Maybe it's an attempt to attract buyers to the more expensive units buy limiting it in the firmware...

 

[SCP]

me too

and me.
Even break long days down and just save them as 01:01 01:02, 02:01 etc

 

[Wapping]

I know people who keep a "Master" file with all the routes they have ever done using copy and paste, you can certainly store loads.

Summat like this, perhaps?

It's reasonably big file, so had to upload it to Drobox in order to get it onto UKGSer... be a little patient while it downloads if you do not have a fast connection.

 

[Wapping]

me too

and me.
Even break long days down and just save them as 01:01 01:02, 02:01 etc

...and me.

I can never quite understand why bods load vast single routes on their GPS's or keep old routes on the device either. Use a route and bin in it is my happy rule. You can always upload it again from the PC. Sensible 660's hold a copy of a deleted route anyway, until such time as the device is next connected to a PC.

It's fine to hold large route files on a PC, the 80 viress a moto in the post above is an example - and useful if you want to plot a long journey or chop routes around - but pointless on a GPS device.

So pointless in fact that Garmin limit the number that can be held actively to about 20 on the 660, representing possibly thousands of miles. Of course it can hold extra ones too, just that they have to be imported before use.

 

[Rasher]

Whilst I know that you can have others on an SD card ready for import I can't see why they've done that

Which reminds me, does anyone know how to remove some routes from the SD card?

As suggested I do a route per day, sometimes more so I may have a short / medium / long option to fit in with how I feel / what weather is doing etc.

So I now have loads on there so when I need to import another one I have to scroll down huge list, it is easy to remove them from the unit itself, but cannot find a way to delete of SD Card, only to import from it.

One last point, and this caught me out big time.

If you use the route tool where you click from point to point and then upload it, the click points do not show as waypoints in the unit, so if you need to ammend your plan a little you cannot take them out (without a PC to hand) to make matters worse it will keep trying to re-route you back to the first of these points you missed (or at least it does on my unit)

Took a while to figure this out, it is also easy to click on the wrong side of a Motorway, I did not figure this out until after it had taken me in a loop between junctions a couple of times

I now plan the route only by inserting waypoints as these can be pulled out of the unit in seconds when on the road if you want to shorten a route.

Lastly my unit gets very confused if you have a route which is a loop, or shares a bit of road twice, if I try programming a round trip it tends to tell me I have arrived just as I try to pull away, despite waypoints in route not being crossed, so unless you want to ride around the block your Hotel is on all day set start point up the road a bit.

 

[Wapping]

I don't use an SD card very often and am certainly no IT wiz, so have never given it much thought. Couldn't you simply copy the routes on the card to a PC (if you want to keep them) and then format the card?

The 'click points' do not appear as waypoints for a very good and simple reason. They would block up the 'favourites' list. You can re-order and shorten routes reasonably easily on the 550 and 660. Of course it's really easiest to shorten routes by simply stopping en-route and turning the device off.

Yup a thick GPS device sometimes struggles with completely circular routes and sometimes with figures of eight..... it's not as bright as the operators, who can usually cope.

 

[Bumpkin]

Maybe the Zumos work differently but, with my StreetPilot 2720 I don't have problems with circular routes (well I haven't so far in almost four years). Ditto with the routing nodes created using the routing tool, it will drop these after a few ignored prompts and carry on with the route. This is not the case with way-points which you have to visit.

 

[Wapping]

Maybe the Zumos work differently but, with my StreetPilot 2720 I don't have problems with circular routes (well I haven't so far in almost four years). Ditto with the routing nodes created using the routing tool, it will drop these after a few ignored prompts and carry on with the route. This is not the case with way-points which you have to visit.

The Zumo's work and perform in exactly the same was as the earlier models.

Sometimes, with a completely circular route - say out from a hotel and back, down the same street to the front door - the device (due to GPS positioning accuracy) cannot tell what side of the road you are on.

Similarly, it cannot tell if you are departing or arriving.... it not knowing what's been going on whilst it was tuned off. It may interpret your departure position as being the end of route target and.... quite logically.... try to take you to it.

Figures of eight are similar in that they are circular. Sometimes. on a complicated junction or in a crowded town with reduced satellite views, the device can get confused as to which direction it is heading, jumping to the other leg of the eight, if you see what I mean.

Or the bod himself gets confused as (depending on the scale of zoom employed) he may be confronted with a mass of magenta which, when married to avoiding cars, pedestrians, stray dogs, his mates, giant bats........ and with music blaring and speed warnings pinging....... the inevitable happens.

Of course everyone has a map and the route written down, don't they,,,,, so it's not a problem.

 

[Rasher]

Maybe the Zumos work differently but, with my StreetPilot 2720 I don't have problems with circular routes (well I haven't so far in almost four years). Ditto with the routing nodes created using the routing tool, it will drop these after a few ignored prompts and carry on with the route. This is not the case with way-points which you have to visit.

My garmin treats the planning points as waypoints, for example we had a long route in Alps last year and cut out a small section of back road and went about 20m down a motorway, as there was a point on the skipped part the route was useless as you cannot go into sat-nav and take out skipped point, 100 miles later it will still be trying to route you back to skipped point.

The SD file is one big file, when you add a route it updates this file, so to take just one route out you lose the lot, if you format card you then need to recompile a mapsource file with all the routes you want to put back - a real pain.

 

[Wapping]

My garmin treats the planning points as waypoints, for example we had a long route in Alps last year and cut out a small section of back road and went about 20m down a motorway, as there was a point on the skipped part the route was useless as you cannot go into sat-nav and take out skipped point, 100 miles later it will still be trying to route you back to skipped point.

I suspect some user error has crept in, particularly if you had auto-recalculate turned on.

When you left your plotted route, to join the motorway, you went 'off-route', that is for certain. The device will know this and, if auto-recalculate is turned on, will - just as soon as you left the route - recalculate you back and probably keep doing so. It may also try to keep telling you to leave at any junctions over the next twenty or so of 'off route' motorway miles so that it can get you get you back 'on route'. That may of course take you back up the motorway you have just come down, simply as it may be the quickest way to rejoin your intended /programmed route.

As soon as you left the motorway and re-joined your intended route (if you ever did) the return prompt should have stopped. Unless somewhere behind you there was a real waypoint (as opposed to a simple 'click point') in which case it may well keep trying to take you back still.

Turn auto-recalculate off or have it on accept YES or NO and many of your problems may well vanish. It may also be worth checking your default routing options.

 

[talljohn]

Guys - thanks for the advice. Now have lots of lovely routes showing up.

Ta,

 

[Rasher]

I suspect some user error has crept in, particularly if you had auto-recalculate turned on.

When you left your plotted route, to join the motorway, you went 'off-route', that is for certain. The device will know this and, if auto-recalculate is turned on, will - just as soon as you left the route - recalculate you back and probably keep doing so. It may also try to keep telling you to leave at any junctions over the next twenty or so of 'off route' motorway miles so that it can get you get you back 'on route'. That may of course take you back up the motorway you have just come down, simply as it may be the quickest way to rejoin your intended /programmed route.

As soon as you left the motorway and re-joined your intended route (if you ever did) the return prompt should have stopped. Unless somewhere behind you there was a real waypoint (as opposed to a simple 'click point') in which case it may well keep trying to take you back still.

Turn auto-recalculate off or have it on accept YES or NO and many of your problems may well vanish. It may also be worth checking your default routing options.

Thanks. Will do some testing before next big trip, got the impression it was treating "click points" like Waypoints as it did not seem to pick up once we re-joined with route.

With waypoints I found you can miss them if you re-start the route it asks if you want to navigate to begining and you can just say no and it carries on.

Now I just click on map and make every point a waypoint and then I know I can remove them "on the go" if I need to.

I certainly avoid creating routes with same start and end points and try to avoid crossovers / figure 8's