So many times when I go out west or even ride on local stuff, I end up riding by myself a lot of the time. Since I'm semi-retired, I have more time to ride and often can't get riding partners to take off. Rather than sit on the couch watching Oprah, I've always just gone by myself. Good machine prep and riding a little more within the envelope has treated me right. Knock-on-wood...I haven't gotten stranded to any degree with a mechanical or injury.

However, my wife worries...believe it or not for some reason...and sometimes I can't get cell phone coverage to check in every evening. So, I decided to get one of those SPOT locaters for my trips and rides. I'll even use it when I'm mountainbiking in some locations. I've been playing with its features and testing it, and it seems pretty cool. I can think of a lot of situations where it will be useful from just checking in with the wife or getting life saving help. Anyone here on the forum try one of these or ride with someone who does? Opinions, problems, observations?

 

Satellite coverage is far greater than cellular coverage. These are great devices that can save a life, if you don't leave it at home

 

A couple of guys I ride with have em and use em on trips into the outback. Great for friends and family to keeep em intouch with your progress. Great for blogs too, for people on longer trips. I like the features they have and the suscription is not too much coin. Tip !: Keep the Spot on your person, not the bike. Man fall off bike in outback, bike on fire, man comes aroun, bike burned along with ALL his kit. Lucky he was spotted by a passing plane flying miners in to a desert rig.

 

I've had Spot for a few years. I also use a ham radio APRS tracker on the bike. Spot coverage is better. APRS is free.

 

They are used on our snowmobile trail groomers here. They work great (as long as operated properly), can actually sit at home and watch it move on a map on my computer in real time intervals. Heavy tree cover kinda throws them off a bit though, or can block the GPS signal all together.

 

Hey TNC, I have had one for about three years now, I use it each night when I am camped to let my wife and a friend (that would be capable of coming to give me a hand if I needed it) know that I am safe and sound each night. I do not have the tracking feature which I believe to take away from the adventure. There is also a total of 100,000 dollar insurance policy for SAR costs which is a good deal. It covers you for 50K twice. The new ones are smaller but do not work any better than the larger orange ones. They also make one that will pair to a bluetooth smart phone or Delorme GPS so you can send a short text message.
All of them send a text message and email to predetermined numbers with an ok message and a link to google earth that pin points your position. The 911 call sends any local SAR or emergency team to look for you.
If you go out to remote places especially alone they are very inexpensive safety tools.

 

Yeah, red, I didn't go for the tracking either. It was awfully expensive for what I thought was a limited feature...plus you had to leave it on all the time while riding, eating up more battery life. I'm going to stop by the local Interstate battery retailer to pickup an extra set of AAA lithium batts to take along.

To make up for the lack of tracking, I'm going to send a new "check in" message each time I branch off on a new trail, so I'll leave a "bread crumb" of my last direction of travel in case I'm incapacitated. At least someone will have my last major course change for the day if worst case scenario has me unable to send an SOS or such.

Yep, I signed up for that SAR insurance deal too. For the price it was hard to beat. More and more agencies are going after people who have to be rescued, and that's kind of understandable for the most part. Just a helicopter ride, if necessary, can almost break the bank.

 

Spot battery life is excellent. I get a whole season out of a set and that encompasses several multi-day treks. I turn it on in the morning and off at the end of the day. To me, the tracking feature is the whole point when it comes to family and friends needing a "welfare check".

 

I have the same batteries that it cam with after three years. It will run on alkaline no problem and if you are only sending in the odd spot check they will last a coons age

 

I get where you're coming from, but if I'm disciplined enough to use it correctly without tracking, I can install waypoints at critical points as I go. Neither my wife nor I are particularly interested in constant tracking either at real time or for later review. I also have a GPS, so I always know where I am when needed. But...I see some riders on ADV using the tracking, and it is pretty cool. That's the nice thing about these units and the optional subscription packages.