Land Rover nav system used to guide C-130 cargo plane
By Evan Blass 
posted May 2nd 2006 4:45PM
posted May 2nd 2006 4:45PM
posted May 2nd 2006 4:45PM
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Total bollocks and a crappy publicity stunt. You don't need bloody GPS to navigate a plane.
did they not think to take the sat nav out of the car 1st? ;P
Ummm, last time I checked, Nice to Corsica is about a 90-100 mile trip, easily accomplished using a compass. You can practically see Corsica once you're done ascending.
This would be an attempt to get people to buy the endless sea of LR3's that are sitting on the lot since the Range Rover Sport came out....
Can someone explain why this is impressive? I have a GPS unit that fits in the palm of my hand that could do the same thing and GPS is old tech.
besides, it's just GPS. They probably could have done the same with a garmin or a tom tom or a magelin... GPS is GPS is GPS... as long as you have 3 satelites, you have a position
Why are there passenger windows on a cargo plane? (the old fashioned theatre stage lights are a bit over the top too)
GPS is not GPS is not GPS. If you tried doing something like this with my MINI's GPS it would freak out. It can only work on digitized radios. So in open water it wouldn't work. But the LR3 has off road GPS.
I think it ad is cool and makes me want to get one even more.
GPS is GPS. There is exactly one kind of it. Your 'digitized radio' thing is not GPS. Quit astroturfing.
I thought all GPS was line of sight. How did the SUV's GPS get a fix on satellites when stuck inside the vehicle?
I bet the C-130 took as much gas as the Land Rover would have had it been on ground. :P
I guess I will be clearer. Not all GPS systems are alike. That's what they are trying to show.
Just basing my comment on my experience, with my car. Where this "stunt" wouldn't work. But some people take comments as if they were life and death.
Well GPS receiver hardware is pretty much the same. As long as you have 3 sats in locked and loaded you're good to go, no pun in 10 did. Anywho, GPS receiver software, however, does differ from one manufacturer to the other. THAT's what makes this special, the fact that the LR includes off road software.
All of those UK GPS receivers must be in air travel mode.
How did the GPS "see" the sky inside the cargo hold of a plane. And, how did the pilot fly the plane and sit in the Land Rover to look at the display at the same time....some new kind of "fly-by-wire" or just a lot of running backwards and forwards??
I'm pretty sure you can see Corsica from the Nice airport. (almost).
"Meanwhile, earthbound drivers in the UK, birthplace of Land Rover, are still unable to use their own GPS receivers to avoid driving over cliffs and into rivers."
Ugh, us Brits are never going to live this down are we..
What a load of crap. Nothing special there. You can use Mapopolis on a pda and switch it to pilot mode. Don't need a 5000+lb LR for that.
Developing tech for the Air Rover?
GPS Hardware is generally the same. However, that being said the software is dramatically different. 90% of GPS Systems will show you in a blank area when not on a road. The Land Rovers' system software is far superior, which warrants why it costs about $2000 compared to your $100 Wal Mart unit
I was more impressed with Range Rover using France as a starting point! I peugeot in your general direction.
I personally think it is fun and cool.
The adventurous spirit of Land Rover is sort of built into the source code. The Range Rover Sport is more of a sports car than a Ute, and it is nice to see Land Rover really building the adventure back into the brand.
I used to own a Discovery SD and it was the most capable vehicle I ever owned. It could do anything. And when I lost her in an accident (and I was unharmed and safe) I really never have had anything like her.
The whole culture of Land Rover, in my opinion, has a lot to do with climbing Mount Everest.
"Why did you climb Mount Everest?" Because it was there.
"Why did you navigate the English Channel with an LR3?" Because it was a cool thing to do.
Sometimes coolness is reason enough, in my humble opinion. This is a British car and the Brits love doing this kind of thing. Germans didn't do this, the English did. If you look at it that way, you can see the playful snarkiness in all the seriousness.
The dry English sense of humor is palpable.
I could just see the tv commercial now. Watching the pilot run back and forth to his pilot's seat and then to the land rover's seat, back and forth.
As a pilot, GPS is GPS simple.
1. Any unit will give you a lat and lon (grid reference). This can be plotted on a chart, yes airline pilots still carry some charts!
2. You can use an extension lead for the antenna and stick it on the window, garmin sell plenty to pilots.
3. Its 4 satellites not 3, one for each dimension plus 1 for time, remembering that GPS recievers dont have an atomic clock built in. If this doesnt mean anything look at http://howstuffworks.com/ you can use 3 but you have to know your altitude above the geode.
4. Airlines have been using less complicated means of navigation using groundstations for nearly 60 years. GPS is modern compared to some equipment still installed.
I have a Land Rover Discovery II and my father has a Range Rover Sport. I don't think this has much to do with the article, but I think the whole point of the stunt was that flight was pretty much the last frontier for Land Rover, I've had my Disco in 3' of water, very demanding mud and rocks, and everything in between (oh yeah, roads too). Then navigation system on the Range Rover Sport does seem to be better than my handheld unit by a few factors. the Range Rover navi is constantly updated, my handheld has some addresses of places that have been gone for many years still in the books. I don't know what kind of flight that is that they took but still, LR was the first to do it so I think that effin' cool.
The fact is that the LR includes off road software.
It can be easily watchable through the airport.
"GPS Hardware is generally the same. However, that being said the software is dramatically different. 90% of GPS Systems will show you in a blank area when not on a road."
My Garmin RoadMate has multiple modes, including water navigation.
I am still confused as to how the LR unit got a fix on the GPS sats without attaching to an antenna on the outside of the plane - and I have never in all my years living near a Lockheed plant, seen a stock C-130 with windows in the cargo-hold. The plane was modified for some reason.
My assumption is that the pilot stayed in the cockpit and a "navigator" was in the LR and communicated via radio on navigation, if the stunt was indeed real.
This is completely retarded. I'm a pilot and the fact that they used a GPS in a truck is completely irrelevant. You don't need GPS to fly a plane. I like how they neglected to mention that the pilot still had to use aeronautical maps to make sure he was in the proper airspace and contacted the proper towers.
The car told him to go in a straight line. Big whoop. I can do that with a compass and spend only 3 dollars.