Using sat nav in ireland

by Caught1once Thu Feb 22, 2024 2:31 pm

I have a 2019 Kingham with the standard sat nav, and intending to visit Southern Ireland in a couple of months.
The 7 digit post code (Eircode) which is used there is not at present recognised by the system
Is there something on the system that can be changed to allow this?

Ken

by gef Thu Feb 22, 2024 3:25 pm

The Tom Tom in my van was useless so I brought a stand alone one it's brilliant

by Kdc Thu Feb 22, 2024 4:06 pm

Ken. I never got to trust my as fitted sat nav,it sent me on inappropriate routes. I use a stand alone unit specific for campers (garmin,others available)and it’s been faultless to date throughout uk and in Portugal last year. I to am off to Ireland early april and tend to use lat long or pinpoint exact spot on sat nav mapping so Irish post codes won’t be bothersome.
Would suggest for touring you would see much improvement over as fitted system in your van.

by Tinwheeler Thu Feb 22, 2024 4:08 pm

Another here who found the built in satnav pretty useless and swapped to a stand alone Garmin.

by IanH Thu Feb 22, 2024 4:17 pm

My sat nav, a poor peoples (stand alone) Garmin was 100% perfect in Ireland!!!

Feed it with decimal lat/long for your various destinations it'll get you there within mm's.

On Google Earth, wherever you put the arrow, the lat/long is at the bottom of the page........

by Caraman Fri Feb 23, 2024 9:02 am

Same as everyone else - the fitted TomTom nav system is poor. Its doesn't know road closures or what the traffic conditions are ahead and the mapping is only as good as the last paid update. I have used Waze, GoogleMaps and AppleMaps on my mobile phone which are good but I found the screen a bit small so have just bought a standalone 7" TomTom Camper Max with free updates and real time traffic information via my mobile phone.

by Peter Brown Fri Feb 23, 2024 10:04 am

Nothing wrong with Garmin but I have a Tomtom Camper in van and basic in MX5, both are logged into the same account and destination programmed in app or on laptop then synced to both. The online traffic monitoring (2G built in) in the camper has proved its worth all over Europe many times.

Google maps is great if you have a phone signal but don't feel comfortable with Waze (although not used much).

by Monty-Plym Fri Feb 23, 2024 10:16 am

I now use Google maps on a Tablet, being offline or having no phone signal isn't a problem if you remember to download the map section you want to navigate to before you set off. Google maps when online constantly monitors the traffic, will suggest alternative routes if there is a road blockage ahead and warns of mobile speed traps (not that I need this latter feature). It is very easy to download the map as shown in this video [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

I used to use Co-Pilot for Android which allows you to enter your rig dimensions and allegedly calculates routes accordingly (99% of the time) but they got greedy and hiked up the annual charges every year with an inflation beating rise.

by Kdc Fri Feb 23, 2024 11:29 am

Hopefully all the information above which is pretty much in the same vain has been helpful to the poster!

by kevjan Fri Feb 23, 2024 2:14 pm

Hi all, personally i would not trust any Sat Nav a decent up to date map is far better but that is only my opinion. Kevin

by Tinwheeler Fri Feb 23, 2024 2:27 pm

I would say use a map as back up to the sat nav but I’ve yet to find a map that equals a sat nav by telling you which lane to be in or shows diagrams of junctions. Neither can you read a map as you drive.

by Caraman Fri Feb 23, 2024 3:41 pm

kevjan wrote:Hi all, personally i would not trust any Sat Nav a decent up to date map is far better but that is only my opinion. Kevin

Its interesting how we always seemed to manage pre-Sat Nav. Before a long journey I studied the map, memorised the route and then wrote a simple route card which I placed in a prominent position on the dash so I could read it as I was driving. If I missed a turning I could generally get back on route, if necessary by stopping and re-reading the map. Things changed after we bought a caravan when going off route could get stressful, especially as my wife doesn't map read. Our first Sat Nav some 30 years ago didn't come soon enough. It was a Navman running on a palm PC in a GPS sleeve. It wasn't perfect so we still had to use the paper map. Now SatNavs are so much better, we rarely use a paper map.

by Peter Brown Fri Feb 23, 2024 4:40 pm

My first experience of GPS was with a receiver plugged into laptop running Autoroute on my sons knees in France. It didn't give directions but he could see when we had gone off route. I then moved to a Palm in a cradle - first time it crashed just as I approached Paris from the north so had to pull over and reset everything but it worked - It also worked well without background mapping in association with paper maps in Florida and Mexico.

I never go on a serious walk (very rare now) without a paper map but must be ten years since I've referred to one during the walk.

by IanH Fri Feb 23, 2024 4:55 pm

My view on maps is that, in EU at least, the road numbering is so complex, sometimes several numbers for the same road, that they are useless.
The sat Nav is infinitely more accurate especially to some of the remote and obscure places we tend to go.
The big reason though not to use a map, is that we're here to see the country, not a bl88dy map!!!

Doesn't affect us now, we don't carry maps at all....

by Roaminghereandthere Fri Mar 08, 2024 8:36 pm

We're Canadians who live in N Ireland The GB /UK post code are mostly pathetic in a lot of places, the Irish service is fantastic and we just use Google and fior the most part it is a good system. Google doesn't differentiate between the size of the road and there are a lot of narrow roads we've travelled allthumbz

on since August 2021 after we took delivery of our 21 kemerton xl.
Good luck on your trip to Ireland, hope it goes very well for you and is an unremarkable time...ie a safe trip.
Cheers Rob

Using sat nav in ireland

Using sat nav in ireland

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