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Navigation System on the Fritz - Intermittent

Discussion in 'Gen 2 Prius Main Forum' started by russw, Jul 28, 2005.

  1. russw

    russw New Member

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    I've got a 2004 Prius with 16,000 miles and just recently the navigation system has started acting erratically.

    A couple weeks ago I was driving from Washington DC to Upstate NY, and in the center of Pennsylvania the locator jumped off the interstate and became more or less stuck. All the time I continued to drive, it showed me still in Pennsylvania, moving around a small radius near where it had jumped track.

    The next day it worked fine. A friend with a navigation system on his boat told me that it could be that there were problems with the satellite.

    Then it did something similar last week around town, and again yesterday on a longer trip. Today it's working fine again.

    I don't want to bring it in for servicing if the problem isn't happening. Has anyone else had similar problems? Could it be the satellite?

    Each time it happened it was pretty hot out, if that could be involved.

    Russ
    Washington DC
     
    #1 russw, Jul 28, 2005
  2. ScubaX

    ScubaX Member

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    GPS units use multiple sat's for data. 3 are required to get a fix and a 4th if altitude is included. Modern GPS units lock onto as many sat's as they can see up to 12 sat's may be locked on. If one sat sent bad data it would be tossed out by the algorithm in the GPS unit.

    It is very unlikely to be a sat problem because the rest of the GPS world would be screaming about it. If your GPS was receiving a minimum of 3 sats only and you lost one, the GPS in the Prius uses dead reckoning and would still have kept you on track until it locked up another sat.

    Bottom line is that your GPS is the problem.
     
    #2 ScubaX, Jul 29, 2005
  3. DanMan32

    DanMan32 Senior Member

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    You can always tell if you have a GPS lock because you'll see the word GPS under the compass/North-Up icon. If you don't see GPS, you don't have a lock and are running ded-Reconing. Coming in and out of GPS may have you jump around a bit.
    I noticed I jumped a bit getting out of Universal Studio's garage. I didn't have GPS at first, and it looked like I was mapped a few feet from the road I actually was on.

    You could also have a loose antenna connection. Someone did report something like that.
     
    #3 DanMan32, Jul 29, 2005
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