"Anchor" wrote in message
news
On Wed, 13 Jul 2005 22:02:44 -0400, Larry wrote:

"FMac" wrote in
:


Have you gone through the Canal? If so, explain what mountains you
noticed. I didn't see any mountains, but I did see and experience a
"Cut". The cut was a bit narrow, but not for a medium sized sailboat.
We spent an overnight in the big lake, caught a few fish, had a great
dinner and pressed on the following morning. The canal is not a
navigational thing, it is nothing more than mere piloting. That said,
I'm aware the transit price has gone up considerably since my transit
in the mid "90's".




Never been through the canal. My post was from a news item I found on a
maritime website. The idea was the canyon it's in may cause poor
reception of WAAS satellite correction data.

Ideas are fine but modern science dictates one dismisses ideas and rejects
theories that do not apply.

In this case the idea that the Gatun Cut causes GPS satellite visibility
issues is nonsense and the idea must be rejected and deleted from your
knowledge base.

The cut is far from a canyon with steep walls. There is plenty of sky for
the GPS to see satellites.

WAAS has nothing to do with it.

Our primitive 1995 vintage Garmin 45 pseudo-tracker multiplexed GPS worked
just fine when we went through the Gatun Cut in January of 1998.

You don't have to be in a canyon to have WAAS problems.
I live in Nanaimo which is on the East side of Vancouver Island. We have
high land to the west and my Garmin GPSMap 182 cannot get a WAAS signal in
my marina. It receives GPS satellite signals without trouble but the WAAS
satellites are low in the south-west and apparently the hills shadow this
signal. Further away from shore I can pick up WAAS signals.