Abu Dhabi Off-Road Club Forums

I just want to share an experience. My Montana 650 is mounted with the original
Garmin windshield suction mount.
I realized that when I navigated to a certain co-ordinate using the compass page,
the compass swirls around without clear direction indication, as soon as I am
driving very slow or am stopped. This was very annoying.
After long brainstorming and various tests, I had the mount opened and the
internal loudspeaker removed. Thanks to AMIT ! VOILA ! The problem is solved !
So it was the magnetic field from the loudspeaker disturbing the Garmin magnetic
compass.
Now I do not have a voice any more when navigating on the road, but I have
clear direction in the desert. I keep the loudspeaker, it can be re-installed any
time.

Thanks for sharing

That was starting to puzzle me. Great work. Thank you.


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Great point.. Thanks for sharing.. It is frustrating indeed!

You might want to try the marine type mount then, it doesn't have a loud speaker, but instead connections to connect to any speaker or Aux input.
Alternatively, you can simply fabricate your existing one.. Just extend the two speaker wires to an external speaker that is away.. Or the stereo aux input if any..

the montans compass does not require a gps connection

Fox wrote:I just want to share an experience. My Montana 650 is mounted with the original
Garmin windshield suction mount.
I realized that when I navigated to a certain co-ordinate using the compass page,
the compass swirls around without clear direction indication, as soon as I am
driving very slow or am stopped. This was very annoying.
After long brainstorming and various tests, I had the mount opened and the
internal loudspeaker removed. Thanks to AMIT ! VOILA ! The problem is solved !
So it was the magnetic field from the loudspeaker disturbing the Garmin magnetic
compass.
Now I do not have a voice any more when navigating on the road, but I have
clear direction in the desert. I keep the loudspeaker, it can be re-installed any
time.

Hallo Fox,

the crusial info in your post is " navigated to a certain co-ordinate using the compass page " so you are only using the layout of a compass but still navigating through GPS, so there is no influence of a magnetic field on that function. The nerves appearance stops when you are driving a few meters.

Regards


Wolfgang

Hi Wolle,

Still, the direction is calculated using the magnetic compass at stop.. & if you are moving it will use the movement direction from the GPS reception..

It is annoying that when you stop the compass direction is very wrong & you have to move to get it right..

To counter this, I used to keep the track log visible so I know where my path was & understand where to go in comparison..

I faced that a lot last DesNav & surely you can live with it once you get used to that.. But having an accurate direction from magnetic compass is very useful...

Hmmm, very interesting indeed! Never really noticed, pretty much stopped paying attention to my GPS when am in Sweihan or Al Khatim , but will check next time am out in the dunes.

Maybe instead of totally removing the speaker ... lengthen the cables for them and put an external speaker, same speaker or aux cable on the other end - but just with enough distance ?

akhateeb wrote:Great point.. Thanks for sharing.. It is frustrating indeed!

You might want to try the marine type mount then, it doesn't have a loud speaker, but instead connections to connect to any speaker or Aux input.
Alternatively, you can simply fabricate your existing one.. Just extend the two speaker wires to an external speaker that is away.. Or the stereo aux input if any..

Right. I had a look at the marine mount, it would solve this problem. The only thing that stopped me is that
the marine mount has to be fixed on the dashboard by screws. Okay, there is a solution to that also, mounting
tape as I am successfully using for the Garmin 276C mount.
Another solution if I decide I want the loudspeaker for road navigation, to buy a second mobile mount and have
one without and one with speaker. Exchange would be no problem between off-roading and on-roading, additional
cost AED approx. 150. Less than a separate marine mount and more handy.

Maybe just a recalibration will do. I had an issue with my garmin earlier and found that FM transmitter used to play flash memories was interfering.
Contacted garmin directly and they sent me the some files for calibration.

Sent from my GT-I9505

wolle wrote:

Fox wrote:I just want to share an experience. My Montana 650 is mounted with the original
Garmin windshield suction mount.
I realized that when I navigated to a certain co-ordinate using the compass page,
the compass swirls around without clear direction indication, as soon as I am
driving very slow or am stopped. This was very annoying.
After long brainstorming and various tests, I had the mount opened and the
internal loudspeaker removed. Thanks to AMIT ! VOILA ! The problem is solved !
So it was the magnetic field from the loudspeaker disturbing the Garmin magnetic
compass.
Now I do not have a voice any more when navigating on the road, but I have
clear direction in the desert. I keep the loudspeaker, it can be re-installed any
time.

Hallo Fox,

the crusial info in your post is " navigated to a certain co-ordinate using the compass page " so you are only using the layout of a compass but still navigating through GPS, so there is no influence of a magnetic field on that function. The nerves appearance stops when you are driving a few meters.

Regards


Wolfgang

Correct Wolle. Just sometimes I might not want to move a few meters , these could be just the wrong direction.
The 650 changes it's mode. When you move, it relies on the GPS. When you go slow or stop, it goes to magnetic operation.
By the way, I think in the menu you can switch this feature off and on.

I tried it today with both the marine type & the suction cup mount, & both worked fine when moving & when standing still...

I updated my unit software a couple of weeks ago, so maybe they introduced some software solution for that?!

Btw, I liked the marine type more, although it had a permanent location in the TJ!

The suction cup mount keeps falling off from time to time especially if I forget it in the sun.. The marine type is a permanent solution..

MalteJK wrote:Maybe instead of totally removing the speaker ... lengthen the cables for them and put an external speaker, same speaker or aux cable on the other end - but just with enough distance ?

Agree Malte. I do not know what the impedance of the built-in speaker is. The remote speaker would have to match,
you would need to drill a hole into the mount for routing the wires to it. Or build a separate housing for the original
speaker instead of a new one. All this sounds a bit too much effort to me.