Author name: Mark Haworth

Have been changing Sat Navs around this week. My trusty (although now ageing Navman) was somewhat behind on map updates. Found out that map updates for it stopped nearly two years ago. What I liked about it was a traffic cradle I had for it that allowed connection to an external aerial. After many tests with the windscreen antenna, I soon discovered that an external aerial was an absolute must.

Anyway, I’ve now acquired my wife’s Garmin Street Pilot with the traffic module built into the charger lead. Thankfully the maps can still be updated but that only happened after considerable faffing around with tech support since the unit doesn’t auto handle the extra SD card I’d put in.

Bad news was (and I should have realised given my experience with the Navman), the traffic module’s (GTM-21) performance with the piece of string that was supposed to be the aerial was none existent.

For those interested, the fix is to cut off the aeial close to where it’s joined to the connector, use a pen knife to cut back some the charger lead to reveal the sheild, and solder on (using coax) an exterior antenna. Mine’s a 2M/70cm dual band mag whip and I’m pleased to report the traffic signal is being received loud and clear all the time.

Until next time….

M.