>> At 09:51 AM 3/9/98 -0600, you wrote: >FYI, yesterday I gave my new Garmin 12XL GPS unit an >immersion test. I think it is false advertising >to claim that this unit is waterproof, and I am going to send a >complaint to Garmin. > An hour is twice as long as 30 min. 22 inches of water is about the same as a meter. I'd expect the battery compartment to take on some water after an hour. It's rated for 30 minutes. >> ************************************************************************** First, 22 inches is only a little over half a meter (0.56 m). Second, If a seal doesn't leak in the first 30 minutes, I don't see why it should leak in the next 30 minutes without an increase in water pressure. I would expect 30 minutes to be the minimum, not the maximum, time the unit would stay watertight. As for the utility of a GPS unit vs. a compass, the other night while trying to get back to sleep I tried to imagine what I would do if I ran across a capsized kayak with no sign of a paddler. The first thing I would do is notify the Coast Guard, and here the GPS unit would probably give a much more precise location than dead reckoning, especially if visibility was a problem. The second thing I would do would be to spread my group out in a long line and search upwind, abandoning the kayak for the sake of speed. (In my imagination, this was happening on Lake Superior, where currents are rarely a problem.) For most purposes, I think a map and compass are adequate, but when I am paddling in low visibility or along a coast where it is sometimes hard to tell one feature from another, I like the idea of being able to double-check my position. Does anyone know of a GPS unit that is *totally* waterproof (including the battery compartment)? Chuck Holst *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List Submissions: paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net Subscriptions: paddlewise-request_at_lists.intelenet.net Website: http://www.gasp-seakayak.net/paddlewise/ ***************************************************************************
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