New Product Announcement: GPS

[Tanner]

I have chased my bird twice with it and I would say that the chance of losing a bird with the gps unit on are very slim. If you consider how strong uhf transmitters are now days anyway, the utility of the gps system viewed purely as a recovery device pales in comparison to the value as a field tool.

[Captain Gizmo]

The RT-GPS has an included straight beep UHF transmitter. This requires a standard UHF receiver to pick up the beep. When the battery gets weak the RT-GPS software first increases the interval between data outputs and eventually shuts the data off and does only a beep at the bitter end of the battery life, as explained by Robert Bagly at the NAFA meet and as best I understood what was said. Note that all of this is in software and can change with a command.

Since the GPS burns the battery hard in the early going there are not a lot of hours left in the beeper when the data shuts off. A completely separate UHF transmitter which can be tracked on the same UHF receiver is recommended as a longer term backup.

Murphy and machinery are old and close friends.

[Captain Gizmo]

I have chased my bird twice with it and I would say that the chance of losing a bird with the gps unit on are very slim. If you consider how strong uhf transmitters are now days anyway, the utility of the gps system viewed purely as a recovery device pales in comparison to the value as a field tool.

The RT-GPS is a Direct Radio Link (Direct Connect) system. As such it shines in what I call Convenience Mode and Short Recovery Mode. It can assist to some extent in Medium Recovery situations and is of minimal use in Long Recovery tasks.

[Paul Mascuch]

A general question. Since I'm completely outfitted with 216 telemetry, can I just buy the GPS transmitter, Direct Link radio, and software and have all the GPS functionality? I could then use my 216 beeper as a second transmitter on the bird for longer term and distance recovery.

Since the GPS transmitter is micro processor controlled, could I turn off the UHF beep function on the GPS transmitter and get a small increase in battery life.

This would be a way to get the new GPS and not have to also buy a UHF receiver.

Paul

[JRedig]

A general question. Since I'm completely outfitted with 216 telemetry, can I just buy the GPS transmitter, Direct Link radio, and software and have all the GPS functionality? I could then use my 216 beeper as a second transmitter on the bird for longer term and distance recovery.

Since the GPS transmitter is micro processor controlled, could I turn off the UHF beep function on the GPS transmitter and get a small increase in battery life.

This would be a way to get the new GPS and not have to also buy a UHF receiver.

Paul

You sure can buy it without a receiver and it will work. I can't speak to turning off the UHF function though.

[Captain Gizmo]

From Robert Bagly's presentation it is clear that all this is controlled in software and the default software at this time decreases the GPS update rate to save current as you go, eventually going to a beacon only state.

It was not clear if you can command the beacon to turn off to start with from your tablet or if you would need to have the factory custom program this for you.
Just call Marshall and ask.

Your external 216 beacon is going to outlast the GPS unit in any case, so the only thing you lose is full redundancy in the overlap period.

[Ryansintx]

I have chased my bird twice with it and I would say that the chance of losing a bird with the gps unit on are very slim. If you consider how strong uhf transmitters are now days anyway, the utility of the gps system viewed purely as a recovery device pales in comparison to the value as a field tool.

Tanner,
How far were the chases? Did you happen to save the data log? If so would you mind posting it.

Like any system the uhf has its limitations. This is my second season using uhf and I lost a bid the other day for two hours because I couldn't get a good signal. Had a dead zone in town where I lost the signal all together.

Trying to triangulate where she was was tough. Figure it would be nice to just see a point on a map and drive to the bird vs driving around hoping to get lucky.

If it helps get a lost bird home faster and with less stress Im all for it.
Thanks for your feed back.
Ryan S.