Coordinates--What am I doing wrong?

I wanted to get some advice. I have a Garmin 60csx. Ever since I started to place caches I have been receiving comments that my coordinates are off. I try to take coordinates on clear days, and always use the average function...I routinely take a minimum of 200 averages, and sometimes 300. My most recent set of hides had the coordinates off by 40 feet or more. I went back and re-took the coordinates (both days were clear skies), and have again gotten comments that the coordinates are off. Clearly I am doing something wrong...but beyond several hundred averages on clear weather days, what else can I do? Is my gps not correctly calibrated somehow? Thanks for any help you can offer!

If your coordinates are consistently off about the same distance (barring any issues with the GPSr itself), it could be you have the wrong datum selected in the setup. The datum should be WGS84. However, if you have the datum incorrect I think you'd be off when finding caches as well.

Another mistake I have seen a few people make is the format of the coordinates.
N 45° 34.120' is not the same as N 45° 34' 12". Most cachers and gc.com use DD MM.MMM which is degrees and decimal minutes.

IMO taking averages when you place the cache is often not enough as most likely the averages are taken using the same satellites in the same position in the sky. In tough signal areas, I prefer to revisit the site on a different day and time and re-average then. I have gone back 4 or 5 different days for troublesome areas. When I go back to the cache, I often load my coordinates and try to navigate to the cache as if I had never been there.

I have never seen "averaging" do a darn thing. I have used several different GPSrs and never once have the coordinates changed from the first ones that show up when the averaging starts, however the supposed accuracy goes up and down a lot. Averaging is waste of time. If you find that you are finding caches within an acceptable distance of GZ, somewhere around 40 feet, I can not tell you what is going on with your cords. I use the caching site method of taking about ten readings and then going back one last time and seeing which one is closest. That can all be done at the same time. I don't have many complaints on accuracy. Another thing I have noticed is that the same kind of GPSrs have a much better accuracy finding caches placed by the same type. Other than that up to 40 feet is not really that bad. There is a seminar tomorrow in Belfast and I am sure you would be able to get hands on help there.

Thanks! :)

Good example today at the event. Almost every caches was about 50 feet off. The hider used an older Gamin GPSr unit. When I was informing the hider of this a couple others said they had the same troubles. Not a big deal as all placed caches were 1 difficulty. Just strange they were all off the exact same amount.

Thanks again. We had hoped to get out to the even yesterday but weren't able to make it. You're right, it would've been a good opportunity to address the issue.

Plenty more events around and coming up and there are always people around that know things.

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Originally Posted by Ekidokai

Another thing I have noticed is that the same kind of GPSrs have a much better accuracy finding caches placed by the same type. Other than that up to 40 feet is not really that bad.

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I'm in South Jersey, and around here people piss and moan over a 20 foot variance. I recently put out a cache and had people griping about "bad co-ords", so I went back to check. There was another cacher there, and his coords put him 12 feet away. I took another set myself, and I also got about that much difference between the co-ords I put on the page (after checking on 4 different days!).

I do have an older GPS, but most of the whiners are newbies using phones to cache. Since this cache was designed to make you look in the wrong place, I figure that they refused to look past the "obvious" wrong place. I refused to change the coords - someone else would still say they were wrong.

I think if you can't widen your search 12 feet... you're just lazy.

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Originally Posted by Team Bayberry

I'm in South Jersey, and around here people piss and moan over a 20 foot variance. I recently put out a cache and had people griping about "bad co-ords", so I went back to check. There was another cacher there, and his coords put him 12 feet away. I took another set myself, and I also got about that much difference between the co-ords I put on the page (after checking on 4 different days!).

I do have an older GPS, but most of the whiners are newbies using phones to cache. Since this cache was designed to make you look in the wrong place, I figure that they refused to look past the "obvious" wrong place. I refused to change the coords - someone else would still say they were wrong.

I think if you can't widen your search 12 feet... you're just lazy.

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Yeah, that's the way things go.