How To – Using Your Garmin GPSr for PCA Tours

by Tom Martin In May 2000, at the direction of President Bill Clinton, the U.S government discontinued its use of “Selective Availability” in order to make the Global Positioning System (GPS) more responsive to civil and commercial users worldwide. This directive effectively opened up a “whole new world” of accurate navigation technology to the general public. Rudimentary, expensive GPS receivers (GPSr) were introduced; embraced mostly by hobbyists. As technology burgeoned, more practical uses were exploited by industry; such as aviation and boating, and most certainly, the automotive sector. That was over 15 years ago. Nowadays, a GPS “nav” unit is almost standard equipment in modern cars. Smartphones utilize it. Watches, dog collars, even underwear can be purchased with GPS technology incorporated to track the location of the bearer. Big Brother lives, and we are him. Drive leaders in the Maverick Sunday Drive program use Garmin GPS receivers, with Drive routes loaded, to guide them along a pre-planned route. The program utilizes the Garmin BaseCamp software to plot its Drives. Three days before a Sunday Drive, a mass e-mail is sent to all drivers who have submitted an RSVP for the event. The e-mail contains three files:

1. Garmin .gdb file of the route 2. Route Overview 3. Turn-by-Turn Instructions

The Garmin .gdb file is a proprietary file which, when loaded into a Garmin GPSr, will guide the user on a specific route, regardless of the criteria of shortest distance or fastest time. In other words, you will get from Point A to Point B in the manner determined by the author of the file. Perfect for Sunday Drives. So let’s load one up and take ‘er for a test run, shall we? Instructions are for the Garmin 2557, but should apply to all new, and some old, Garmin models. First step: Save the .gdb file from the PCA Tours e-mail to your computer, preferably to “Desktop”. Then you’ll need to install the “BaseCamp” program on your PC, which is available for free at the Garmin website. Go to: http://www.garmin.com/en-US/shop/downloads/basecamp to download the BaseCamp software. Once installed, launch the program. Next, connect your Garmin unit to your computer with the USB cable that came with your GPSr. After powering up, BaseCamp will recognize the unit. To upload the .gdb file to BaseCamp: go to the Toolbar and left click on “File”, then select and left click on “Import into My Collection”. (figure 1)

Highlight the .gdb file, and then select “Open”. (figure 2)

Now that the .gdb file is stored in BaseCamp, send the file to your Garmin unit, first by selecting it in “My Collection”. (figure 3)

Go to the Toolbar and left click on “Device”, then select and left click on “Send to Device”, and then “Send Selection to Device”. (figure 4)

Highlight your GPSr from the list and then select “OK”. (figure 5) After a few seconds, the route will be loaded into your Garmin unit.

That’s all there is to it. So now that the route is loaded, hook your unit up to your Porsche and let’s drive! At the start up screen, select “Apps”. (figure 6)

Select “Trip Planner”. (figure 7)

Select the route you just loaded. (figure 8)

Press “GO”. (figure 9)

Press “Start”. (figure 10)

It is important to note that the default waypoint is the second waypoint of the route. The first waypoint is the start point of a Sunday Drive. So if you are already at the starting point of a Drive, you would simply press “Start”. If you are starting from anywhere else, such as your home, you would select the first waypoint before pressing “Start”. Now follow the purple road and do exactly what the voice tells you to do. (figure 11)

If so desired, you can create your own personal route in BaseCamp for yourself, or to share with others. Be advised that the program is not really intuitive or user-friendly. BaseCamp Training Videos are available for viewing at: http://www8.garmin.com/learningcenter/training/basecamp/. If you find these instructions inadequate, independent study is highly recommended. There are several excellent tutorials posted on “YouTube” that may prove more useful than the Garmin library. And if you develop an interesting drive that you would like to see incorporated into the Sunday Drive program, by all means feel free to forward it to me at: tours@mavpca.org. Hope to see you and your Garmin on a future “Sunday Drive”!