Sat Nav with main roads preference?

[Ian Bosman]

I use my smart phone Apple Maps, shortest takes you on strange routes but quickest usually opts for motorways but there is usually a set of different routes from which you choose. I tend to avoid tolls

 

[Ian Bosman]

BTW some mapping uses Apple CarPlay, Apple maps, Google maps, Here we go, Waze. Here we go has a very strange Upper class male voice!

 

[MillyMoHo]

I've tried a few sat navs but am looking for a simple but fast one with main roads preference. I do not need one where you input height and width, and prefer a dedicated unit, such as a Tom Tom. Present one has shortest route, quickest, motorway, but resorts to silly small roads at random.

We use a Garmin one which is affiliated to the CAMC and is specifically designed for Motorhomes. Has worked really well so far.

 

[Ian Bosman]

As i have said a few times you cannot really go wrong with a smart phone and either Apple Maps or Google Maps. Both offer alternatives and you can set to not use motorways and/or tolls. Both work with Apple Carplays which is on a lot of vehicles these days.

 

[JockandRita]

As i have said a few times you cannot really go wrong with a smart phone and either Apple Maps or Google Maps. Both offer alternatives and you can set to not use motorways and/or tolls. Both work with Apple Carplays which is on a lot of vehicles these days.

But you can't enter dimensions, weights, or number of axles, so can quite easily find yourself on a totally unsuitable route, pending the size of your MH.
Those you mention appear to be car specific only.

Cheers,

Jock.

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[Ian Bosman]

But you can't enter dimensions, weights, or number of axles, so can quite easily find yourself on a totally unsuitable route, pending the size of your MH.
Those you mention appear to be car specific only.

Cheers,

Jock.

You obviously did not read post #1 where the mention of sizes was not wanted

 

[Guigsy]

But you can't enter dimensions, weights, or number of axles, so can quite easily find yourself on a totally unsuitable route, pending the size of your MH.
Those you mention appear to be car specific only.

Cheers,

Jock.

I also challenge that weights and dimensions make that much of a difference:
-It's rare that you'll do a journey with legal restrictions that affect motorhomes.
-The mapping around restrictions is incorrect or missing far too often.
-Country lanes where your mirrors are bashing the hedges on both sides is not a restriction, so no satnav will stop you from using these.

So I'm really unconvinced it's worth getting a mediocre satnav just because it claims to do weights and dimensions.

 

[Ninjabob]

-It's rare that you'll do a journey with legal restrictions that affect motorhomes.
-The mapping around restrictions is incorrect or missing far too often.
-Country lanes where your mirrors are bashing the hedges on both sides is not a restriction, so no satnav will stop you from using these.

So I'm really unconvinced it's worth getting a mediocre satnav just because it claims to do weights and dimensions.

Your points in order:

My Bailey is 8ft2ins mirrors folded (about the same as a London Bus). There is a 7ft width restriction 400yds from my house that my TomTom Camper will avoid every time.

Mapping around these kind of restrictions is spot on.

My Bailey is over 9ft wide mirrors extended and TomTom Camper will avoid narrow country lanes as long as you over emphasize the dimensions of the vehicle by making it appear articulated lorry sized. When I say overemphasize in my case it is only slightly as I tow a SMART on an A Frame.

Setup correctly (and that is the secret) a decent Camper/Truck SatNav is invaluable in my experience.

 

[JockandRita]

You obviously did not read post #1 where the mention of sizes was not wanted

Oh yes I did, however there will be others reading the thread, who will be seeking advice themselves, and taking notes, not just the OP.

So I'm really unconvinced it's worth getting a mediocre satnav just because it claims to do weights and dimensions.

Whereas, as an experienced HGV 1 & PSV 1 driver, as well as the owner driver of a large MH, I am convinced, providing it has the correct files installed.

Your points in order:

My Bailey is 8ft2ins mirrors folded (about the same as a London Bus). There is a 7ft width restriction 400yds from my house that my TomTom Camper will avoid every time.

Mapping around these kind of restrictions is spot on.

My Bailey is over 9ft wide mirrors extended and TomTom Camper will avoid narrow country lanes as long as you over emphasize the dimensions of the vehicle by making it appear articulated lorry sized. When I say overemphasize in my case it is only slightly as I tow a SMART on an A Frame.

Setup correctly (and that is the secret) a decent Camper/Truck SatNav is invaluable in my experience.

Absolutely spot on.

The only time our correctly set up (and dedicated) Truck Sat Nav will take us down a narrow lane, is when that is the only access available, just as it would the council refuse trucks, or the heating oil delivery tanker.

Cheers

Jock.

 

[Guigsy]

Your points in order:

My Bailey is 8ft2ins mirrors folded (about the same as a London Bus). There is a 7ft width restriction 400yds from my house that my TomTom Camper will avoid every time.

Mapping around these kind of restrictions is spot on.

My Bailey is over 9ft wide mirrors extended and TomTom Camper will avoid narrow country lanes as long as you over emphasize the dimensions of the vehicle by making it appear articulated lorry sized. When I say overemphasize in my case it is only slightly as I tow a SMART on an A Frame.

Setup correctly (and that is the secret) a decent Camper/Truck SatNav is invaluable in my experience.

I'm wondering if we should set up a thread that tests the different satnavs to see how good their mapping and routing is. I know of 3 width restrictions where so far none (Tom Tom, Road Lords, Sygic Truck, Zenec) have got them right. Maybe we collect a bunch of examples to see if one is a clear winner and to see how accurate they really are?

Narrow country roads are perfectly legal for wide vehicles to use, just it's a bad idea. If you navigated to a campsite half way down one of those lanes, it'd still take you there, so it's not putting them off limits. When deciding a route, its algorithm treats each road as a link that has a journey time and it looks for the quickest route. To reduce the chance of picking them, the mapping just has artificially slow journey times on these roads, so they are rarely chosen. But if it thinks it can save you enough time, it will send you down one of these roads regardless of how wide you set your vehicle.

There's a lane I know in Norfolk where my mirrors will literally touch the 3m high hedges on both sides for a about 100m in the summer. All the satnavs I've tried will use it, including Sygic Truck when I set it to a 44t arctic lorry. They all say it's about 2 minutes longer to follow the main road a bit further in to town and take the junction with another main road. It's just trying to cut the corner. In reality it doesn't save any time at all.

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[Old Gibber]

Birmingham city centre changes its road layout nearly every week. Google normally reflects the change in days and it's automatic. Open Street Map is pretty good (although that's crowdsourced, so is always updated quicker in populous areas). You're not going to get daily updates with a dedicated satnav that you have to manually update.

Google/Waze also has really good traffic info. It's reliable enough that when it says there's congestion ahead on a main road or motorway, you can let off the accelerator as you round the corner because you know it'll be there. From the few hundred miles I've done with TomTom, it's nowhere near that accurate.

Google also has alternative routes displayed on the map continuously. Imagine you're coming up to a junction and it's signposted towards your destination, but Google is saying to go the other way, on the map you can see the other route marked with a grey line and a marker that says how many minutes slower it is. It provides excellent confirmation. Or you're going along the main road and it says to pop down a side-street, but you can see that continuing on is only going to cost you a minute, so you stick on the main road. I've not seen any other satnav do this on the fly. It's incredibly useful.

The only thing that the dedicated satnavs have over Google Maps is awareness of road width/weight/height. But none of them even claim to stop you going down narrow lanes... because technically you are still allowed to go down them. So you'll still end up burying your mirrors in a hedge. It'll only stop you going through restrictions. But I've found so many errors in the satnavs I've tried that I actually think it's a little bit dangerous because you trust that it'll work and it doesn't. Also... restrictions are in reality pretty rare, so having a mediocre satnav just because it claims to know about restrictions isn't really worth it in my experience.

Frankly I find Google's habit of constantly displaying alternate routes distracting. Especially when I have previewed the route already before setting off.

Sorry but you are just plain wrong. Mine does avoid narrow lanes wherever possible, one just has to get the preferences right.

Obviously you know little of dedicated sat navs.
How about lane guidance on motorways and other roads which Google doesn't do?
or enlarged map view when one comes to roundabouts or junctions?

I could list many more, but as a regular user of both, I would always use the dedicated sat nav when in the motorhome.

 

[bobnick]

We have a Bailey 79 and to date have had no issues using the Garmin with motorhome settings.

 

[Guigsy]

Frankly I find Google's habit of constantly displaying alternate routes distracting. Especially when I have previewed the route already before setting off.

Sorry but you are just plain wrong. Mine does avoid narrow lanes wherever possible, one just has to get the preferences right.

Obviously you know little of dedicated sat navs.
How about lane guidance on motorways and other roads which Google doesn't do?
or enlarged map view when one comes to roundabouts or junctions?

I could list many more, but as a regular user of both, I would always use the dedicated sat nav when in the motorhome.

I work in the industry. I built some of the mapping for the early Navteq based satnavs ~20 years ago. My information isn't totally up to date, but I've got a reasonable idea about how they work.

It avoids narrow lanes because it assumes a slow journey time. Not because it knows anything about their width.

 

[Suenliam]

Confusion reigns!!!!!

I'm in the market for a sat nav for our pvc. It's only 6m x 2.05 (plus mirrors). When a passenger, I like using maps and despite being female, I am a good navigator....... but now I am the main driver I need a decent sat nav to avoid the " well I don't know which way to go - it's not on this map" response when we get to a T junction

Is Truck Sat Nav a make or a generic term?

I like the idea of detailed lane directions when on motorways etc and avoiding height restrictions inparticular. Most usage will be in France. I would rather have a straight forward machine which won't take us up side roads with low bridges just to chop 10meters of a journey. Prepared to pay for the sat nav which does what I want.

Does anyone have any recommendations which would meet this criteria?

Thanks in advance.

Sue

 

[DelViv]

We use this one

Motorhome & Caravan Sat Navs | Camper Van Sat Navs | Aguri

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aguriworld.co.uk

You can set the length and width of your vehicle and we have had no issues with any routes so far. Just my opinion mind lol

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[Old Gibber]

Confusion reigns!!!!!

I'm in the market for a sat nav for our pvc. It's only 6m x 2.05 (plus mirrors). When a passenger, I like using maps and despite being female, I am a good navigator....... but now I am the main driver I need a decent sat nav to avoid the " well I don't know which way to go - it's not on this map" response when we get to a T junction

Is Truck Sat Nav a make or a generic term?

I like the idea of detailed lane directions when on motorways etc and avoiding height restrictions inparticular. Most usage will be in France. I would rather have a straight forward machine which won't take us up side roads with low bridges just to chop 10meters of a journey. Prepared to pay for the sat nav which does what I want.

Does anyone have any recommendations which would meet this criteria?

Thanks in advance.

Sue

As a recent solo driver, my Fiat van came with an 8" Xzent motorhome sat nav as standard. It is has detailed lane guidance, has clear enlarged guidance of forthcoming roundabouts and road junctions, and, of course, has height and width restiction warnings and avoidance. Some of the features I particularly like are:
The 8" screen. This large screen is really useful as a solo driver.
The ability to give warnings of junctions a couple of miles ahead. This gives time to study the junction on-screen before arriving at the junction.
The ability to warn of speed limits, with a curt "You are over the speed limit". Its not always 100% accurate but nevertheless I found this really useful in France. It cannot obviously account for temporary speed limits.
The preview ability, so that you can check the route beforehand, and select an alternate route is preferred.
The very clear voice guidance.
It also comes with a full campsites POI list.

Crucially, as with any sat nav, it is important to get the settings and preferences right. With the route preferences set to "Easy" the Xzent avoids all the narrow lanes wherever possible.

This year alone I've driven 5000 miles solo both in the UK and on the continent in the motorhome, and never once taken the wrong turning thanks to the Xzent.

 

[Old Gibber]

I work in the industry. I built some of the mapping for the early Navteq based satnavs ~20 years ago. My information isn't totally up to date, but I've got a reasonable idea about how they work.

It avoids narrow lanes because it assumes a slow journey time. Not because it knows anything about their width.

May have been true 20 years ago when GPS for domestic use were in their infancy. Things have moved on significantly since those early days. Mine certainly does not appear to give slower journey times when on minor roads.

 

[Ninjabob]

May have been true 20 years ago when GPS for domestic use were in their infancy. Things have moved on significantly since those early days. Mine certainly does not appear to give slower journey times when on minor roads.

One of the things that never ceases to amaze me is the accuracy of the arrival times on my TomTom.

 

[Ian Bosman]

This thread started with Dorwyn #1 stating that he was not interested in SatNav systems with weights, heights, widths, so although it is very interesting, surely any such discussions on systems that claim to offer it should be on another thread? I am more than well aware of the limitations of Apple and Google Maps, etc as well as their advantages.

 

[Old Gibber]

This thread started with Dorwyn #1 stating that he was not interested in SatNav systems with weights, heights, widths, so although it is very interesting, surely any such discussions on systems that claim to offer it should be on another thread? I am more than well aware of the limitations of Apple and Google Maps, etc as well as their advantages.

Not really. The fact that you can put vehicle dimensions in and then select the appropriate route preferences means that the sat nav does avoid small roads, as my Tom Tom does.

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[Dorwyn]

My point was that my TomTom often puts me on small roads unnecessarily even when there's no time benefit. It'll take you off a good road onto a narrower class road, then put you back on the same road. And more often it takes you along smaller roads as you get closer to your target. So perhaps there's one that just sticks to good roads. There doesn't seem to be, but most people are happy with their present choice.

 

[SpeedyDux]

My point was that my TomTom often puts me on small roads unnecessarily even when there's no time benefit. It'll take you off a good road onto a narrower class road, then put you back on the same road. And more often it takes you along smaller roads as you get closer to your target. So perhaps there's one that just sticks to good roads. There doesn't seem to be, but most people are happy with their present choice.

All satnags are fallible. Memorising the paper maps before the journey means you can ignore with confidence the silly instruction to turn off the major road and divert via a narrow lane to cut a few metres off the route.

OT - my Garmin now has traffic info again. Thanks to a new Garmin power lead with traffic receiver (GTM 36) with free UK/Europe lifetime* traffic info subscription. From activegps.co.uk. No need for a (paid) smartphone app.

*lifetime ... yep, well, that can be subject to the whims of Garmin as we know.

 

[63720]

Satnavs plan a route by drawing a straight line between 2 points and looking for connecting roads as close as possible.

 

[Jim]

Sat Navs are fantastic, but only if you tell them where you want to go. If I am in an area I don't know well, no way do I rely on the SatNav to get me to my destination. After years of driving heavy, wide motorhomes I tell it where I want to go. I look at a map, then add loactions into the satnav

This can be simply by inputting towns, villages as legs of the particular route. Or when touring France in an RV plotting the PRECISE route on my computer and then loading it onto my satnav. Then I'm directed on my route, just as I like it, and no surprises.

 

[bobnick]

Without Sat Nav our biggest trip would be to Waitrose down the road.

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[Ian Bosman]

Not really. The fact that you can put vehicle dimensions in and then select the appropriate route preferences means that the sat nav does avoid small roads, as my Tom Tom does.

So tell me how you tell Google or Apple maps the vehicle sizes as I have no idea how to do it

 

[Old Gibber]

So tell me how you tell Google or Apple maps the vehicle sizes as I have no idea how to do it

You can't, hence the value in a dedicated motorhome sat nav.

 

[Old Gibber]

My point was that my TomTom often puts me on small roads unnecessarily even when there's no time benefit. It'll take you off a good road onto a narrower class road, then put you back on the same road. And more often it takes you along smaller roads as you get closer to your target. So perhaps there's one that just sticks to good roads. There doesn't seem to be, but most people are happy with their present choice.

That doesn't happen on my Tom Tom if I set the route preferences correctly. It really does avoid small roads, unless that is the only way to get to the destination.

 

[JockandRita]

My point was that my TomTom often puts me on small roads unnecessarily even when there's no time benefit. It'll take you off a good road onto a narrower class road, then put you back on the same road. And more often it takes you along smaller roads as you get closer to your target. So perhaps there's one that just sticks to good roads. There doesn't seem to be, but most people are happy with their present choice.

My specific Truck Sat Nav doesn't.

That doesn't happen on my Tom Tom if I set the route preferences correctly. It really does avoid small roads, unless that is the only way to get to the destination.

Ditto, and the only time I am directed on to a narrow road, is usually for the last two or three miles, ie, the only way in to my destination.

A tip for those using Google or Apple mapping, if unsure about a route off the motorways and dual carriageways, zoom in to it and check for bus stops. If there are any on that route, you'll be fine.
Although I don't use Google Maps as a Sat Nav, they are great for up to date info regarding traffic queues and roadworks.
I also use them for waypoints, ie, I zoom into a location or a route, click on "what's here" , and copy the coordinates into my Truck Sat Nav, and just like Jim, it takes me where I want to go, not where it thinks I need to go.

Cheers,

Jock.

 

[Dorwyn]

I will say I am using a now outdated and, judging by its failing battery, beyond its prescribed life, very basic TomTom Go 50. But what am I not doing correctly Old Gibber? Don't use shortest route, only use toll roads when I need to, which just leaves quickest route. There are no other choices. I don't need a dedicated mh one, since it's just a pvc I'm driving. Just had an example today, going north along the N21 to Bergerac, it tried to turn me off along a yellow road, only to put me back on the main N21 some miles later. Which I didn't take, because we have a map.

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