My Zumo 396 is forcing me to re track and cover missed shaping points

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Biker Bill
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My Zumo 396 is forcing me to re track and cover missed shaping points

Post by Biker Bill »

I was out with friends on a planned 92 mile route through country lanes yesterday but came across two road closures. Once having manually found our way around the closures my Zumo 396 insisted on trying to make me go back and cover the missed way shaping/via points. It drove me nuts.

I posted on the Garmin site thinking it was a Base Camp route design problem. Should I have been using Way points, Shaping Points or Via Points when planning the route?

I got a nice prompt reply saying this was a problem with my Zumo not a Basecamp problem.

Any thoughts on what I am doing wrong or could do differently when planning the route in Basecamp, sending the route to my Zumo 396, riding the route with the Zumo?

Would love to get a solution as its driving me nuts.
sussamb
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Re: My Zumo 396 is forcing me to re track and cover missed shaping points

Post by sussamb »

Biker Bill
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Re: My Zumo 396 is forcing me to re track and cover missed shaping points

Post by Biker Bill »

Thanks sussamb for the reply. I read the post from jfheath and learn't some interesting points. However when I was using my Zumo 396 even once I had regained the original purple route line the other side of the road closures, the the unit was still telling me to turn left or right and displaying a second purple track that I can only assume was taking back to the part of my route where the road was closed.
sussamb
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Re: My Zumo 396 is forcing me to re track and cover missed shaping points

Post by sussamb »

If there was a waypoint or viapoint on your route there it will try to get you back, as those points must be visited unless you manually skip them. A shaping point once you're back on route will be ignored. The key in my mind is only to use viapoints for places I must visit, eg a lunch or fuel stop.
jfheath
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Re: My Zumo 396 is forcing me to re track and cover missed shaping points

Post by jfheath »

Its possible that you missed a Via Point as well as a shaping point.

It is a good reason to try to minimise the number of points that you need in a route. Not always possible, but often a single carefully chosen points in the middle of a section of road can replace lots of points placed too near to road junctions. The logic being that if it has to travel 10 miles to get half way along a section of the route, it might as well travel the other half of the same road in order to reach the end.

One trick if this happens is to pull over at the side of the road when you are on the magenta route. Press skip. Wait for it to recalculate. Keep doing this until it starts to naviagate ahead.

Question is, how did you miss the points in the first place ? Check how accurately they were placed on the roads.

How did you create the route ? BAsecamp ? On the satnav ? Some other software ?

Waypoints in Garmin speak are simply saved locations. Places that are stored somewhere (in 'Favourites' or 'Saved Locations' on the Zumo). When put into a route, a Waypoint is treated as either a Via Point or as a Shaping Point. By default it is a Via Point, but any route point no matter how it was created can be switched between being one or the other.

Who told you that it was a Zumo problem - not a Basecamp problem ? No - I don't want to know. But they are talking .....

Drop me a PM with your email address. I'll send you a document written for the 590 and 595. I believe that the 396 operates ina similar way to the 595 - although i have never had my hands on one. And if you care to post me a link to the Garmin site where you asked the question, I'll be able to fill in the missing word and explain what points are being missed.

Today, I discovered something really important. I found another way that doesn't work.
sussamb
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Re: My Zumo 396 is forcing me to re track and cover missed shaping points

Post by sussamb »

Link is here https://forums.garmin.com/apps-software ... ing-points and it was me that told him and pointed him here :D

You'll see from the question there was no mention of BaseCamp, just an issue with routing on his device. Garmin are strict on keeping the BaseCamp forums clear of device issues, hence me pointing him here.
jfheath
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Re: My Zumo 396 is forcing me to re track and cover missed shaping points

Post by jfheath »

Ok - I understand the issue.

All of the answers above are spot on.

@sussamb is also a respected member of this forum. I think that he was directing you to a better forum to address the issue that you are having rather than saying that the fault was with the Zumo itself. The place you posted was a Basecamp Forum - so he was probably directing you here where you were likely to get a much better answer.

The answer is that there is nothing wrong with either Basecamp or the Zumo with respect to your issue. What you describe is exactly the way that the Zumo works. So the real problem is to do with understanding what is happening. And what is happening is do with where you place your route points and what type of route points they are.

Many people use the term 'waypoint' to indicate a point on a route. Garmin does not. To Garmin, a Waypoint is a location that has been saved for future use. As soon as a point - any point, including a saved waypoint - is put into a route, it becomes either a Via Point or a Shaping Point. Which one it becomes is up to you - you can change it in Basecamp. They behave differently - but on the Zumo screen they are easy to distinguish.

Via points are marked by flags. Garmin sometimes refer to Via Points as 'Destinations'.
Shaping Points are marked by small blue circles or discs.

Via Points announce as you approach and when you arrive - ie the display a message on the screen banner and a voice says something in your speaker/headphones. The later Zumos 'insist' that you visit Via Points. (The 39x series, 59x series and the XT).

Shaping points give no text or verbal indication that youa re approaching or have just passed. The Zumos will always navigate you to a shaping point, but they are a bit more forgiving - they will allow you to ignore them IF you join the magenta route after the missed shaping point.

So here are a few examples of what happens in routes when you miss a route point. A=Start, Z= Finish V=Via, S-Shaping. ---- is the magenta route.

A --- S1 ---- S2 ---- S3 ---- S4 ----Z

Due to a road closure, you cannot get to Point S2. You take a detour and the satnav will nag you to make turns get you to go to S2. It is doing what you asked it to do. You decide to ignore the instructions and aim to rejoin the route before S3 having missed out S2. As you approach the road joining S2 to S3, the satnav is still trying to get yo to go back to S2, you ignore it and head towards S3 instead. The satnav immediately changes its mind and happily takes you to S3. Why ? You are now on the magenta line, you are heading in the direction that the route is going and it is quite happy to take you to S3 and stops trying to get you to go back to S2.
For this to work, you have to rejoing the magenta route after the missed point, and be heading in the correct direction.

You could press the SKip button which will effectively remove S2 from the route list. This will stop the nagging and find a new route from where you are now to S3.

Same diagram, same situation but this time your miss out points S2 AND S3. The result is the same - the satnav will always nag you to go to S2 (never S3), but as soon as you join the magenta route somewhere after S3, it will happily take you to S4, forgetting that you have not visited S2 and S3.

Again, you could press skip. The first press will remove S2 from the list and start to navigate you to S3. So you would need to press it again to remove S3, so that it would then start to take you to S4.

Of course, there is no guarantee that it won't try to take you on the road that is blocked !

Next example
============

A --- S1 ---- V2 ---- S3 ---- S4 ----Z

There is a Via Point in this example.

You miss S1, V2 and S3 and intend to rejoin the route after S3 but before S4.
On your detour, the satnav will forever be trying to get you to go back to the next point in its list - which is S1. It doesn't matter how far down the road you are, you have not yet visited S1, and the satnavs job is to take you to it. It will do this unless you Skip S1. When it will move to directing you to the next point on its list. V2.

As described above, it is quite flexible about shaping points, and if you rejoin the magenta route after missing shaping points it will continue with the navigation. But if you miss Via Points - well no, It won't do this. So even if you rejoin the magenta route before S4 - it is still trying to get you to go back to S1 - in effect you are now in a completely different section of the route (after the Via Point). It cannot just ignore that.

There are a few way out of this.

Join the magenta route and press skip. You don't know how many points you have missed so you could look at the preview map. You need to press skip 3 times. Or if you can't work it out, press skip until the satnav start directing you in the way that you are facing.

The XT has a nice option - closest entry point - which gets you out of such situations. I don't know if your model has this feature. I suspect not.

Or load the route, tap the blue disc alongside S4, and it will change it to a Via Point. Then restart the route and choose this point as the next destination.

There is an avoidance tool - which I tired a couple of times, but I did not find it particularly useful.

Road works are a real pain when it comes to satnav navigation.

The best tips I can give are to keep the number of Via Points to a minimum (not none) - make them points that you will definitely pass through. Give them names that you recognise (although the 595 and the XT change the names you give, unless you made them as Waypoints).

Do not lace the route up with a lot of shaping points like some people suggest. When you get into difficulties, having a shaping point every couple of miles really hampers your attempts to navigate a detour. How many times do you have to press skip ? Try this at home. Plot a route with a shaping point every half mile and then set the route running and completely ignore it. Go a different way. The drive towards the magenta line. Can you work out where you are in relation to the route ? I couldn't when I tried it whe I first got my 590. In effect I was lost less than 2 miles from home on roads that I know very well. I was on the magenta route heading where I thought I should be going, but the stanav was wanting to make me go the 'wrong' way. And that was 'cos I had missed a Via Point somewhere on the route. Now imagine that in an area that you do not know.

In my 250 mile day trips I will have maybe 5 Via Points inlcluidng start and finish. These are placed on the road that I want to be on after an coffee break. Then maybe 2-4 shaping points, carefully positioned to ensure that the route goes along the road sthat I want.

I have no avoidances set in Basecamp. I have no avoidances set in the Zumo, and I set the route to use Fastest Time.

One piece of useful information - if you have a route with only Shaping points, then if you are on the magenta line heading in the right direction, the satnav will take you to the next shaping point from where you are. No matter how many points you have missed.
However, Via Points have really useful uses on satnav routes. But they must be placed in loactions that Garmin would regard as a 'Destination'. A coffee break for example. After the Via Point you are starting a new section of the route.

In Basecamp you change the type of route point by double clciking the route and getting the route list which lists all of the route points.
Right click to get the popup menu and it will allow you to set it as 'Alert on Arrival' (Via Point) or 'Don't Alert on Arrival (Shaping Point)'

Beware changing Via Points to Shaping points on the Zumo itself. The XT and the 595 will both change the name of the point and relocate it to a different position. Its eems to shift the point from side roads to a point on the fastest road between the two adjacent points. The 590 doesn't do this. I don't know about the 390 series. I suspect a link with the units that have FourSquare installed, but that's based ona sample of just 3 Zumos. If anyone could confirm or deny this for the 390, it would be helpful. Changing Shaping Points to Via Points works fine.

Today, I discovered something really important. I found another way that doesn't work.
Biker Bill
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Re: My Zumo 396 is forcing me to re track and cover missed shaping points

Post by Biker Bill »

Thanks jfheath (& sussamb) for the nice clear explanations. Most appreciated.

Having looked on you Tube and other forums I found a lot of confusion with the terms Way Point, Via Point & Shaping Point being described differently and seemingly being interchangeable. So thanks for the full and clear explanation!

I have plotted a 45 mile trip around north Essex which I am familiar with anyway and will give it try on Thursday by making a deliberate detour or two and seeing how the Zumo hopefully brings me back on route.

Thanks again.
jfheath
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Re: My Zumo 396 is forcing me to re track and cover missed shaping points

Post by jfheath »

Most welcome.

When you plan your routes - have a bit of paper with a diagram like the A S1 V2 S3 S4 Z that I drew above.
Try it first with just shaping points. Then stick a Via Points into the route and notice the difference.
Put a shaping point half a mile up a dead end. and watch what happens when you ignore it. Then try it with a via point.

It makes a lot more sense if you realise that the Zumo is just following a set of points in a list like that.

And it has a couple of simple rules: You can leapfrog Shaping Points. You can't leapfrog Via Points.
But while you are in the air, it will be instructing you to go to the first one being jumped.

The waypoint issue comes from other stanavs and other mapping programs using the term differently. People may have transferred to Garmin and have not yet recognised the difference. But it is a very good way of deciding whether to take much notice of what is being written. I'm not saying Garmin are right and others are wrong. Its just using the words that Garmin have defined for their satnavs.

Today, I discovered something really important. I found another way that doesn't work.
Biker Bill
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Re: My Zumo 396 is forcing me to re track and cover missed shaping points

Post by Biker Bill »

Hi there, thanks again jfheath I planned myself a route and made a couple of deliberate diversions and then rejoined and all went well. Wouldn't you now it I then came across another road closure and got to try it out for a third time. Couldn't get back on the planned route until half a mile from the end where I was planning lunch, once again it worked just as you said. By the way if you are ever in Thaxted try Parishes on the High Street, they do an excellent cooked breakfast!
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