Anyone else suffer regular GPS failures?
Hi again all,
As a good weather VFR only type of PPL I enjoy dead reckoning as much as the next man and always thoroughly plan my routes, mark up the charts accordingly, and monitor progress on my PLOGs. Additionally I also have a Garmin GPS 3 Pilot and another Garmin GPS 89 as a backup incase my batteries packup in the main GPS. Like most people I find the GPS a fantastic gadget to backup my visual nav, and on many occassions the GPS has put me right when "temporarily uncertain of my position" (ie lost!).
Since using the handheld GPS units (around 4/5 years) I have had several occassions when the devices have failed. It's not usually that one stops and the other works but they tend to both fail together - usually following a "poor GPS coverage" message. On Monday evening for example when flying some non-pilot pals around the Milton keynes area both units had no significant satellite lock and the GPS 3 said "power down and re-init" - which incidentally doesn't cure the problem!
This probably happens in one in ten flights, fine when I know where I am like Monday but not much fun if I'm going somewhere new (hence my belt'n'braces approach with charts etc).
Does this only affect me so frequently or do others have similar problems? I am using the units inside a PA28 resting on the "dash" with the antenna pretty much vertical. I'd love to know if anyone else has such frequent issues with their handheld GPS whilst in the air. Test runs in the car by the way always work fine!!
I so often read about people relying on their GPS all the time, I certainly dare not rely on mine!!
Looking forward to your comments,
- Andy.