Locate an Auto Repair Shop in Bagdad, Arizona

Bagdad, AZ Car Consumer Discussions

Re: First 10,000 miles [saabgeorge]

by hiwayman on Tue Jan 15 09:46:47 PST 2008

Agree on all counts. Like I said, you "assume" your odometer is correct. GPS in general will always be more accurate than your odometer. There are factors which can affect the GPS, and there are factors which would appear in GPSs made by two different companies. First, the things that will affect a GPS in general.... GPS is, of course, actually a military system. There are two levels of accuracy transmitted by these GPS "constellations" (groups of GPS satellites). The military broadcast is accurate down to about a yard, or even less, depending upon other factors (I'll get to those in a sec). The civilian broadcast is much less accurate, and the military actually imbeds what's called a "dither factor" into that signal, so that the accuracy continually changes from a yard or two, to easily dozens of yards. This is to prevent a foreign nation from using our own technology to guide their weapons. What you will see in civilian GPSs of ANY kind or maker, is a changing accuracy caused by this dither factor. But wait, there's more! GPS accuracy is also depended upon the number of satellites your unit can "see". The minimum number of GPSs your unit must be able to see to get lat/long and atiltude are 4. Cheap GPSs, then, often have just 4 channels. But your GPS can be a lot more accurate, if it can see more satellites. Thus, good GPSs often have 12 channels. Now here's the rub. GPS satellites are not geosyncronous, meaning they do not stay in the same place in the sky at all times, like TV, weather, and communications satellites do. So, at any given time, there will be a number of GPS satellites in the sky, with others popping up over the horizon, and others going out of sight over the horizon. Your GPS unit keeps track of where these satellites are supposed to be with something called ephemeris data (it's a file that uses time of day and lat/long of the unit to generate a sky map for the GPS of where the birds are). Downloading this file from a satellite is why your GPS takes longer the first time you turn it on, or after it's been stored for a while. The accuracy of that ephemeris data and how it is updated is actually closely guarded by GPS manufacturers. It is the keys to the kingdom, so to speak. Becasue of all these factors, your GPS, ANY GPS (without the inertial navigation system that NAHs have for tunnels and deep valleys) will have varying accuracy from day to day, and yes, even from minute to minute. Interesting side note here. In the beginning of the second Gulf War, when we weren't sure when the military was actually going to attack, I had my GPS turned on. It's an older Garmin model which displays the dither factor. Minutes before the first cruise missles slammed into downtown Bagdad, we saw the dither factor go nuts. We knew something was about to happen. OK. So you have two GPS units in your car which are telling you different things. My guess is that there is a part of the car or surrounding environment that is blocking the sky view for one of the units, making it less accurate. If your TomTom is more accurate, that's cool, but I bet if you kept using the GPSs, together, you'd find days where the NAH is more accurate. One other thing you have to consider is that the two GPS systems may actually be affecting each other. GPS is nothing more than fancy radio signals. Units on the ground lock onto radio signals by generating their own radio signal, and then comparing it to the signals in the environment until it finds what it's looking for (It's actually called "superhetrodyne" for you electronics geeks). Since there is a radio signal being broadcast by each GPS unit, the OTHER unit in close proximity to it can actually be picked up, and confuse the unit. It doesn't happen often, but it does happen.... Additionally, the designers of the GPS systems have to make judgement calls as to things like "what is an exit?" Sounds like a simple question. But where do you place the "X" that says "exit" in your onboard maps? At the tip of the lane split? At the first curve? Half-way between one highway and another, along the exit ramp? This can be a very difficult decision, since there are so many different kinds of exits, ramps, merges, etc., etc. Obviously, since this is proprietary software, TomTom and the people that make Nissan's GPS make different decisions.... All that being said, I've been particularly underwhelmed with my Nissan's GPS. It has taken us on some sight-seeing trips that got us to a destination nowhere near where we wanted to go. Odd. Very odd. Now, we basically use the GPS on long trips to let us know how much farther it is, miles/time-wise to our destination (Are we therrrrrre yet?!?!)

Re: Guys........jae & lemko [lemko]

by rockylee on Tue Sep 18 15:46:58 PDT 2007

Did you ever think about becoming a police officer? Yeah lemko, but you got to have a department willing to sponsor you pal. We had 18,000 ex police officer's looking for work in 2006 thus their is strong competition for every opening. Unless you want to live in Detroit, which has many area's less safe than the streets in Bagdad, you can't get a sponsorship to get MCOLES certified. I've put in for several law enforcement type jobs but the competition is unfortunately just tough pal. :( The bottom line is Delphi, is now talking about shutting down a plant in Wisconsin and laying off 200 meaning those folks will have preference and recall rights when ever Delphi's Wyoming, Mi. plant hires. They got to call back the elgible Coopersville, workers first shattering any hope of working their any time soon. Lemko, only if you knew what I'm going through pal in my divorce. At least you appear to have a very good women and she is marriage material. :) -Rocky

Re: ... [lilengineerboy]

by habitat1 on Sat Jun 30 04:48:45 PDT 2007

"Replace "boon" with "bogus excuse". IMO, the biggest boons to automatics are (1) laziness, (2) ignorance and (3) apathy." I'll add a fourth. (4) lazy, ignorant and/or apethetic parents that set a bad example and don't teach their kids how to drive a stick. According to one of our teacher friends who used to instruct at a defensive driving school in the summer, kids that learned how to drive a stick early, consistently did better at accident avoidence maneauvers they taught at the school. At one point they wanted to switch to manuals for the course, but, because the parents are given the test at the beginning of the class, too many didn't know how to drive a stick themselves. His position is that anyone - parent or child - that finds driving a stick too challenging or requiring too much coordination is a disaster waiting to happen on the Washington Beltway and they shouldn't be issued a drivers license. P.S. When one of my wife's friends questioned him on that position a couple of years ago and climed she was a "great" driver (she can't parallel park without tying up traffic for 5 minutes), he invited her to take the test. In front of several parents and students, she came in dead last and hit more cones than she missed. She was subsequently banished from carpooling for school field trips. Her car (Mercedes E320) looks like it's been parked in Bagdad for a year. There isn't a panel without a dent somewhere. I don't think she's safe driving a golf cart. If the ability to drive a manual as a pre-requisite for getting a driver's license, she'd definitely be walking and the world would be safer.

Saw my first FJ Cruiser today.....

by woodyww on Sat Apr 15 14:09:12 PDT 2006

at a Toyota dealer in Mass. Black Cherry. Sticker was $33K something (W/o dealer add-ons), so I assume it was fully loaded(?). As much as I liked the way the exterior looked--the vehicle looks as stunning in person as it does in the photos--the interior looked just really dark, & like something out of a military vehicle, or Road Warrier movie. I guess that's the idea? And that will appeal to some. The narrowness of the windshield just seems ridiculous, unless you're driving around Bagdad a lot & it would give snipers less of a target perhaps. If I had the $$ to buy one as a "toy" or 2nd vehicle, I might, but I think the visibility issues might get frustrating if I drove it all the time. Still, I am intrigued.... Just my 2 cents.....

no1trust

by grunschev on Thu May 09 07:49:06 PDT 2002

Berthold rays, LOL! If you drink enough tranya you can counteract the Berthold rays! I'm thinking Sedona is farther than Tucson, but that might be because I'm in the south east valley. I think Flagstaff is about twice as far from Phoenix as Tucson is, and Sedona is closer to Flag than here. Maybe 90 miles to Tucson and 120 to Sedona. But these are just guesses. Ah, yes. The drive on 60 towards Vegas can be a blast. It's much safer now that they've upgraded much of the road. And you get to see such great cities as Nowhere and Bagdad. Igor

Rw ..

by rroyce10 on Mon Mar 17 13:45:42 PST 2003

...... Ok, let's take a look see .. it's an Ecab, it's a 4x4, it's an LE, it's got a little cancer going for it, it's a V8 .. oh yeah, it has 100k.        Up in your area, you "might see" $1,0/$1,5 on a trade, if it's deep in rubber, no french fry invasions - ooop's, no freedom fry's hanging from the mirrors, no click click in the 4x4 .. but, the way it's described, maybe more towards the ghee whiz figure ..        This is a great vehicle for Retail Rd .. $3,900 in the paper and $2,5/$3,5 sends that puppy down Bagdad Rd ..             I hope this helps ...                Terry.