Rand McNally RV GPS

Still nothing better than MS Streets and Trips or similar program to plan your route and see where it is taking you. Then you can make changes to fit the way you want to go.

Blindly trusting almost any GPS will get you into trouble or at least waste a lot of fuel far too many times.

I too have these strange routings. I do know that i can set priority for fastest or shortest routes and it is supposed to automatically use my preference. Sometimes i think it forgets my preference. So now i ask it to compare routes before telling it to "go.". Unfortunately, the shortest route very often does take you off the highway, or put you through the center of a stop light ridden business route through town versus staying on the interstate by using a by-pass. I would think that predictive traffic or real traffic, or traffic everywhere, the latter two being extra cost items, would adjust for this, but they do not.

Now i could understand this for a shortest route that takes a lot more time than the fastest, but this is not the case. Something is clearly wrong with the logic used. On my non rv garmin i could set assumptions for city driving (15-20), county roads (45-55), and interstate (60), you are stuck with rand's default. Rand's adjust trip length feature in theory should fix this, but it does it to entire route not by road type. It does work if all you do is 90-100% interstate for the trip..

Regarding three right turns versus one left. Detailed manual discusses this, saying it recognizes that some rvs are more difficult to turn left, but rands solution is pick a different rv type in your rv settings. You must guess how much smaller of an rv you need to get access to normal left turns. This should be an avoid in city. Or always avoid feature, but it would be better as a knowledgeable of the route logic feature. I don't think anyone has that detailed road knowledge.

We have about the same problem with our 7710. We were in the left turn lane at an intersection we know and the GPS is telling us to go straight and make three right turns. We had several other similar instances. Now we compare the 7710's route with google maps before leaving. JMO but I think Rand McNally is over rated.

KO wrote:
I just bought the RV GPS from Camping World . . . the unit made me take some really round about way to get to my destination.

Anyone else having this type issue with this unit?

Yep, both my 7710 and now 7720 have this "feature".

Turning the "avoid dirt roads" feature on or off doesn't seem to matter.

We're relying more and more on the CoPilot Live app on our iPad.

I have the 5500, after coming from the Garmin 7200 this is trash!!!

I purchased the Magellan RV9165T-LM back in May when we purchased our Class A thinking it would be better for navigating our MH because it took into account things like size and weight and had all of the destinations. After a few trips with it, I have found that it does OK but has lead me on some questionable side roads but its biggest issue (unrelated to this topic) is that it just won't stay on during an extended trip.

I found that the TomTom app on my iPhone has been far more solid in getting me where I want to go and has most of the options I am looking for anyway. I ran it along with the Magellan on every trip to compare it, since it was a known and trusted unit. I am now looking at using my iPad Mini with TomTom as a GPS Nav system once I can find a mount for it.

that is why I wouldn't want to rely on any GPS that I couldn't plan a route on my computer and down load it into the GPS. On one of my trips planned by my GPS I spent the night off of I-85 and my next days trip was to a site on I-85. for some reason my GPS wanted me to veer off onto some other road. at least my current GPS just says "recalculating" when I go the right way whereas a previous one kept telling me to take a U turn at the next possibility. :)
bumpy

I have the RVND 7710. Only used it about three times. First trip from Tennessee to the Gulf Coast of FL., I programed it for three very well known RV park destinations that I know by heart anyway. Really just wanted to test the accuracy. Two of the three the RVND 7710 would have taken us either past the destination or down a wrong road. I reported the two incorrect points to "Tell Rand", with the EXACT coordinates of the two locations, six months later they still haven't updated the map. I would not trust it as far as I could throw it.
My Verizon cell phone with GPS is much more accurate.

We have the Rand McNally 7720 and it took us to Alaska and back. We love it. One time it was giving us an outrageously ridiculous route. Found out I had it set to avoid dirt roads and we were headed toward the Top of the World Highway which is ALL dirt. LOL I changed that setting and we were good to go.

I would look at all the "avoidance" maneuvers and see if it is set to avoid something that was on a route. That said, they aren't perfect, but we were happy with the overall performance.

Dale