Zumo 396 - What am I doing wrong?

[Gomer]

I was coming out of North Carolina and wanted to avoid Interstate 40 so I used Trip Planer to map a route on 2 lane roads. Some of these roads and intersections were little tricky to navigate so I was hoping it would guide me through it. It was a little tedious but doable. I saved the route and it was exactly as I drew it. When I went to use the map, I selected it from saved trips, I picked the destination, Zumo calculated the route and put me right on I-40, ignoring most of my hard fought planned route.

Ok you say "well you need to put in one of your locations", well I tried that and it still tried to take me the quickest route.

I tried all the different calculation settings, Adventure routing, Fastest time, Shorter distance. Nope. Waisted my time!
I gave up and used the paper map.

Earlier I tried using BaseCamp and planned a 1200 mile trip. Loaded on my Zumo and I had trouble with that also. Looked great until Zumo calculated the route. I could only put in the next location or it would cut parts of my route off to get me there faster. What a pain in the ass, it was not reliable at all. Yes I tried "adventure Riding".

So it appears I bought a great device if I want to get to a city or an address as fast or shortest route possible. Works great for finding a motel or restaurant. But not a device that will take me on a complicated well planned route of my choosing.

Any idea why this is not working for me? It should not be that difficult.

[lkraus]

I think that the problem occurred because the Zumo had a chance to re-calculate. I think that the 396 works sufficiently similar to the 590 that @jfheath's PDF, "Zumo 590 + 595 & Basecamp - What the Manuals Do not Tell" will be helpful. Even though you do not use Basecamp, John's explanations will tell you a lot about how a Zumo "thinks", where to place the starting point, which point to select when starting a route (NOT your ultimate destination), and how/why to avoid recalculations.

[mpenner]

Yes, this is a problem with this GPS and all others. The best solution that I have been able to come up with is the following:

1. Plan the route in BaseCamp just as you have done
2. Once you have exactly what you want save it to the GPS as a route and a track.
3. On the GPS, display the track in a different color than the route.
4. When the GPS deviates from your original route, it will be obvious since the GPS track will be in a different color than the route
5. Follow the track when the GPS tries to go it’s own way

With this method you get turn by turn directions most of the time, but you can follow your original plan when the GPS gets a mind of its own

[Oop North John]

The 396 has in my opinion the same problem that the XT has in that it chooses faster roads over a route that is the fastest. This gives some "interesting" routes which might be giving your problem.

I've seen it where the sensible option would be to go between the open ends of this > but the 396 chooses to stay on the longer & slowest time option of staying on the lines.

[Gomer]

Thanks, I read the article and it did bring some of points to light that were probably causing my frustration. The recalculation after missing a route point and stripping the ghost points out I'm sure was an issue.

I guess the bottom line is it doesn't function as I thought it would, lots of nuances, not as intuitive as I thought. I would need to use the article as a guide for the next trip I did in BaseCamp for sure.

Still not sure why my trip planner (I made on my Zumo) wouldn't follow the route.

Every time I load a saved route whether a BaseCamp or trip planer, my Zumo says "calculating" and that is when it gets changed. The article mentions that but says you need to find out why. OK.

The track idea is a good one thanks for that.

[lkraus]

Every time I load a saved route whether a BaseCamp or trip planer, my Zumo says "calculating" and that is when it gets changed. The article mentions that but says you need to find out why. OK.

My guess is that you planned your route from your current location to your final destination, which is reasonable. When you start the route it asks you to select your "Next Destination". It makes no apparent sense to pick your current location since you are already there, so you pick the end point. This is the intuitive choice that most people would make.

The problem is that the Zumo always calculates a new route segment from your current location to the via point you just selected as your "Next Destination", ignoring any planned route, via points, or shaping points that are in between. This is usually what the Zumo is doing when it says it is calculating the newly loaded route. The solution is to place the starting point at a distance from the location where you expect to actually start riding, whether that is a hundred feet from your parking spot or somewhere on the road out of town, and then use that point as your "Next Destination". The Zumo will then follow the planned route once you pass thru the start point. (Another reason to put the beginning of the route at a distance from your parking spot is that the first point is always a via point that you must pass through. There is enough wiggle room in exact GPS location that you might be in a slightly different spot and then you will be instructed to U-turn and go back.)

Some other examples:
Let uppercase letters represent via points, lowercase represent shaping points, let P be your current parking spot.
If the planned route sequence is AbcDefgH, you can select A, D, or H as your Next Destination when you load the route at P.
Choose H as Next destination, the Zumo calculates a new route (using your default routing method (Fastest, Curvy Road, etc.) from P to H, ignoring the presence of AbcDefg.
Choose D as Next destination, the Zumo calculates a route from P to D, then follows the planned route DefgH.
Choose A as Next destination, the Zumo calculates a route from P to A, then follows the planned route AbcDefgH.

If you are planning with Basecamp, be sure that the Basecamp map on the computer is the same version as the one on the Zumo. A map-mismatch will trigger recalculation of the entire route.

[Gomer]

lkraus,
That is exactly what I did, selected the end point and the start point was at the motel. It makes sense now why I am having trouble. Boy Zumo has some real weird quirks, not what you would think.

So if something happened and your trip got interrupted, to start your route back up in the middle of it you would have to select your next destination up the road. Ah, making sense now.

[lkraus]

So if something happened and your trip got interrupted, to start your route back up in the middle of it you would have to select your next destination up the road. Ah, making sense now.

Exactly.

It helps to have a few intermediate via points to choose from, or identifiable shaping points that can be converted to shaping points by editing the route on the Zumo.

[JD Hog]

I have always saved my new routes on my Zumo XT to my memory card so if a route gets changed from re-routing I can delete it and import it to the saved routes again from the memory card so it is back the way I routed it originally.

When I am on a vacation I delete all saved routes from the Zumo XT and just keep the routes for the vacation in the memory card. That makes it much easier when a route has changed from re-routing to bring it back from a shorter list on the memory card.

[jfheath]

I have always saved my new routes on my Zumo XT to my memory card so if a route gets changed from re-routing I can delete it and import it to the saved routes again from the memory card so it is back the way I routed it originally.

When I am on a vacation I delete all saved routes from the Zumo XT and just keep the routes for the vacation in the memory card. That makes it much easier when a route has changed from re-routing to bring it back from a shorter list on the memory card.

That is good advice - the XT changes the gpx file on transfer and on import, and actually removes tracks and saved Waypoints from it, if the route is sent to Internal storage. It does not alter anything on the SD card.

It is a good idea after deleting everything from the Zumo to then put one Waypoint / Favourite back. Just tap the map to create one and save it. Because of some glitch - the XT reckons that there aren't any waypoints to import unless it already has one saved in internal storage. !!!! Yes they have been told. No, they haven't fixed it.