When in a caravan it is a challenge to keep track of the vehicles behind you. When in the forest a single turn and you lose sight of the vehicle behind you. In the desert you want to stretch out to avoid the dust. Add to that challenge the simultaneous need to navigate, keep track of the schedule, provide trail information to those behind you, and concentrate on the road and someone always Keeping track of the vehicles in your group, while navigating the trail, and someone always seems to get separated. APRS is a simple and elegant solution to this problem. Automated Position Tracking System (APRS) station allows you to see on your GPS or computer based map the location of other APRS beacons. A beacon is an APRS station that only broadcasts its location. Byonics has release a new fully integrated beacon that you can place on the vehicles in your expedition group. You will then be able to see the location of each vehicle.
The solution requirest that you buy the tracker, an antenna and GPS and that the pieces get soldered together (sigh) but it looks very straight forward to compile. If you were to buy a GPS, I'd suggest getting one that has the SIRF Star III chipset. It is sensitive enough to be able to stay locked on to the satellite signals even under tree canopy.http://www.byonics.com/microtrak/mt8000.php Tracker (w/ 8w amp): $150 http://www.byonics.com/microtrak/mt_antenna.php http://www.byonics.com/tinytrak/gps.php The GPS can be found cheaper elsewhere, but this allows you to single source it. GPS (Byonics GPS2): $69 Antenna: $9 |