Does anyone here use a Garmin GPS to replace / supplement the native navigation?

[LostVector]

So yes … I know it’s a first world problem, but the built in nav is just a little short of where I want it to be … so I’ve been considering throwing in a Garmin Drivesmart GPS?

Pros to the Tesla Nav
Built in range estimates
Integration with supercharger network

Cons to the Tesla Nav
stalls up without connectivity (I park in a underground garage)
Too many unnamed roads
Lane guidance comes very late and is not consistently available

Nav on my phone is much better, but offline is still not great and if I need to quickly check something for whatever reason, I’m having to multitask on the phone which I really do not want to do when driving.

So I’m thinking maybe a Garmin could be an improvement? Even tho there are clunky aspects to the software, it’s still a pretty customizable interface with many years in the Sat Nav space. The smaller model might even serve as a reasonable instrument cluster in the Y.

Thoughts?

 

[SidetrackedSue]

I had the same thought and expressed it on our recent road trip. It was met with derision. It will be put in place for my next solo road trip. The tesla instructions are so late or confusing at times that I found I had two longish detours due to the system on my last solo drive. The first was the worst since it was extreme fog so I couldn't navigate using the road signs.

In my own city, I also miss the upcoming road names so I know at a glance my next turn is NOT the upcoming street when in unfamiliar parts of town.

And sending instructions from Google maps to the car is useless since you can't send routes with way points. And if there is an unknown/unnamed road (as you say, this is common) then the sent map fails.

On our recent road trip, the car was producing absurd routes and I couldn't disavow it of its conviction I had to drive an hour back to a previous SC instead of continuing on. Not a big deal except our upcoming hosts needed a ETA and we were unable to give one since the car wouldn't map out the route and thus come up with an estimate based on what we were doing, not what it thought we should do.

I suppose a reboot may have worked but it may not have and I am reticent to drive on an unfamiliar highway without a screen (therfore no speedometer.) Had the garmin been in place as a HUD, I would have had my speed during the reboot.

 

[LostVector]

I had the same thought and expressed it on our recent road trip. It was met with derision. It will be put in place for my next solo road trip. The tesla instructions are so late or confusing at times that I found I had two longish detours due to the system on my last solo drive. The first was the worst since it was extreme fog so I couldn't navigate using the road signs.

In my own city, I also miss the upcoming road names so I know at a glance my next turn is NOT the upcoming street when in unfamiliar parts of town.

And sending instructions from Google maps to the car is useless since you can't send routes with way points. And if there is an unknown/unnamed road (as you say, this is common) then the sent map fails.

On our recent road trip, the car was producing absurd routes and I couldn't disavow it of its conviction I had to drive an hour back to a previous SC instead of continuing on. Not a big deal except our upcoming hosts needed a ETA and we were unable to give one since the car wouldn't map out the route and thus come up with an estimate based on what we were doing, not what it thought we should do.

I suppose a reboot may have worked but it may not have and I am reticent to drive on an unfamiliar highway without a screen (therfore no speedometer.) Had the garmin been in place as a HUD, I would have had my speed during the reboot.

You're not alone ... sounds very similar to my experience and it's a tad relieving to know I'm not the only one thinking this could be better.

I decided to jump in on experimenting with this. There are currently excellent deals on refurb Garmin Drivesmart 66 and 86 models on ebay ... 125 USD for the 66 and 219 for the 86 (these were about 10% less a couple of days ago too).

I just purchased a 66 that I'm going to mount on the dash behind my steering wheel as a makeshift GPS instrument cluster. This will be with the ProClip Tesla Center dash mount, which is the only mount i can find that might sit low enough on the dash for an unobstructed view.

I'm tempted by the 86, but it's too big to see through the steering wheel, so I'm just going to experiment with the 66 for now. With the 86, I would likely need to mount it over to the left side, figure out how to run power, and orient it in portrait mode.

My plan for our upcoming road trip is to use the Tesla Nav on mute for the battery estimates, and the Garmin for the actual Nav.

 

[archae86]

I've owned GPS receivers since I bought a used Magellan which came back unopened from Desert Storm. Later ones were Garmin, and starting with the III+ which had maps, I've had one turned on sitting on my dashboard for the great majority of miles driven since then UNTIL we took delivery on a Tesla model Y in March 2022.

While I took along the Garmin on the delivery pickup trip (we live in New Mexico, and had to pick up in Colorado Springs), and kept it as a spare in the console for months, I found myself greatly preferring the Tesla navigation. I currently only keep the 3597 alive to pack it for navigation on rental cars.

While the 3597 is by now old, quite a few still think it was one of Garmin's best. I think Tesla is better--a lot better.

 

[LostVector]

I've owned GPS receivers since I bought a used Magellan which came back unopened from Desert Storm. Later ones were Garmin, and starting with the III+ which had maps, I've had one turned on sitting on my dashboard for the great majority of miles driven since then UNTIL we took delivery on a Tesla model Y in March 2022.

While I took along the Garmin on the delivery pickup trip (we live in New Mexico, and had to pick up in Colorado Springs), and kept it as a spare in the console for months, I found myself greatly preferring the Tesla navigation. I currently only keep the 3597 alive to pack it for navigation on rental cars.

While the 3597 is by now old, quite a few still think it was one of Garmin's best. I think Tesla is better--a lot better.

Where do you feel the Tesla nav comes out ahead?

 

[archae86]

Where do you feel the Tesla nav comes out ahead?

A big, big advantage for me in the overall system is considerably superior voice searching for destinations. With the Garmin, I have to consider how to fit my need to the available categories, use phrasing carefully configured to fit requirements, and still often fail to get what I need.

With the Tesla, shockingly often I can just say what I want in the most natural way, and it resolves ambiguities and considers locality in a way that often just immediately shows me my desired destination, and in other cases gives me a possible match list with a high chance that my real desired one is near the top.

I find it easier to see what is going on in complex intersections with the particular way Tesla displays them.

I've found the estimated time of arrival accuracy and consistency to be considerably better on my Tesla than on my 3597. It helps that the Tesla uses reasonably up-to-date traffic data to adjust ETA, and here in Albuquerque the nearest place my 3597 even gets traffic data is El Paso. (I realize that newer Garmins have different traffic data arrangements).

Though I seldom turn it on, when I like having the option of showing overhead photography in the map view. I find it particularly helpful in working out what is going on in light industrial areas, bigger shopping districts, big church parking lots, and the like.

Speaking of strip malls and such, my Tesla is much more likely to know the actual location of a particular small business than is my Garmin.

I think there is more, but they don't come to mind right now. I have no doubt there are points of advantage to the Garmin, but the only important one for me is that I can stick it with a beanbag mount in my carry-on, and have useful navigation I know how to use as soon as my rental car clears the garage.

Your mileage may vary.

 

[LostVector]

A big, big advantage for me in the overall system is considerably superior voice searching for destinations. With the Garmin, I have to consider how to fit my need to the available categories, use phrasing carefully configured to fit requirements, and still often fail to get what I need.

With the Tesla, shockingly often I can just say what I want in the most natural way, and it resolves ambiguities and considers locality in a way that often just immediately shows me my desired destination, and in other cases gives me a possible match list with a high chance that my real desired one is near the top.

I find it easier to see what is going on in complex intersections with the particular way Tesla displays them.

I've found the estimated time of arrival accuracy and consistency to be considerably better on my Tesla than on my 3597. It helps that the Tesla uses reasonably up-to-date traffic data to adjust ETA, and here in Albuquerque the nearest place my 3597 even gets traffic data is El Paso. (I realize that newer Garmins have different traffic data arrangements).

Though I seldom turn it on, when I like having the option of showing overhead photography in the map view. I find it particularly helpful in working out what is going on in light industrial areas, bigger shopping districts, big church parking lots, and the like.

Speaking of strip malls and such, my Tesla is much more likely to know the actual location of a particular small business than is my Garmin.

I think there is more, but they don't come to mind right now. I have no doubt there are points of advantage to the Garmin, but the only important one for me is that I can stick it with a beanbag mount in my carry-on, and have useful navigation I know how to use as soon as my rental car clears the garage.

Your mileage may vary.

Thanks ... very insightful and makes sense. I'll keep that all in mind as I start comparing the two. The RV GPS product from Garmin has satellite imagery, but is much more expensive with bigger screens.

I have the DriveSmart 66 placed pretty well in front of me now, so the only thing left to do is wait for the road trip this weekend.

 

[Occhis]

If you’re using a second device why not just use your phone with your preferred app, Google maps, Apple Maps, etc.?

 

[LostVector]

If you’re using a second device why not just use your phone with your preferred app, Google maps, Apple Maps, etc.?

The main reasons are:

1. I don't have connectivity in the garage and it's hard to start navigating without that ... it can sort of work, but it's a very delayed experience on a smartphone or in the Tesla Nav. It really isn't like a GPS designed for offline operation.

2. I've found I like to leave the phone for phone things. In the past few months of navigating with Google/Apple Maps alongside the Tesla Nav, I've found that if need to quickly poke at my phone for whatever reason, having to multitask in and out of maps is far more distracting than I'm comfortable with.

3. The dash area is empty in the Model Y and I suspect I would really enjoy having some useful info in that area.

 

[Rice&Curry]

The Garmin/ Magellan will work even when there is no cell tower or connection as it does not rely on cell connectivity. In the middle of nowhere ( remote areas in Death Valley or National Parks) Garmin will still work, may take a little longer to find and establish location from the overhead GPS satellite but it will still work unless you are parked inside a cave or a garage. .

 

[LostVector]

First impressions after one day of road tripping.

1. Need to order a few more accessories from ProClip to get the device into the exact viewing position I want. It’s still sitting too high.
2. Tesla’s nav likes to introduce a lot of spurious “continue on the highway” waypoints. The Garmin hasn’t done that nonsense so far. If it’s 50 miles down a highway, the turn by turn will give you a 50 mile away waypoint. It will still occasionally guide you away from making an accidental exit, but doesn’t include those as waypoints on the turn by turn .
3. Lane guidance so far is substantially better.
   1. The Garmin uses more natural indicators to help you navigate … such as “pass this street and turn at the stop sign”.
   2. The Garmin visualizes with a simulated graphic what an exit intersection is going to look like so you can prepare ahead of time.
   3. In one particularly complicated intersection, it even displayed an animation of the road I was on showing me what lanes I needed to be in at that moment, and then displayed a new lane being added on the right from an entrance. That was impressive. I can’t figure out why this particular intersection triggered this feature ... perhaps it’s something they only go to the effort for in high traffic areas.
4. The user interface still has the feel of a clunky GPS from years ago, despite the use of modern hardware. You can tell the hardware has helped a lot but is being held back by underinvestment in the software. The GPS map, for example, seems to animate at 10 fps, not 60. The user interface just lags and stalls in certain places.
5. The large screen of the Tesla is an obvious advantage over the smaller screen Garmin for getting a feel of what’s around you.
6. Search on the Garmin again feels old. It searches around where you are, and if you are going to a different city, you have to edit your search in a cumbersome way to relocate your search, or qualify your search with “in Los Angeles”, for instance.
7. You can plan and save entire trips and routes on the Garmin with the Route Planning feature. I’m not sure this is actually helpful for me … still playing with it. But for some I imagine it‘s got to be very very helpful.

So far, despite its shortcomings, I’m reasonably pleased. The lane guidance is truly better so far and the positioning of the GPS keeps important information more directly in my field of view. The “clunkiness” of the interface is obviously not welcome, but on the flip side, I’m getting the sense that spending some time understanding the ins and outs of the device will overcome a lot of quirks.

This is only one day of driving with the thing, so certainly more opinions to come.

 

[LostVector]

Day 2 of driving with the Garmin reinforced how much better the lane guidance and spoken guidance is vs the Tesla. It visualized several tricky intersections naturally by showing me and telling me what lanes to be in well ahead of time … including the lane I ought to be in right now even tho more lanes are being added at an interchange, etc. The spoken guidance seems to have many more special case ways to describe various tricky intersections and turns, which helps keeps my attention on the road.

One downside I noticed with Garmin was the relative slowness of rerouting when you miss a turn or ignore the given route. It can leave you a bit on edge waiting for it to complete so you can follow the route again.

Again, I mostly made sure to save our intended waypoints ahead of time on the Garmin, so the relative clunkiness of entering a destination wasn’t a problem at drive time.

 

[LostVector]

Final road trip notes on the Garmin ... definitely a keeper as far as I'm concerned. My full road trip report is here.

It took some additional work to mount the Garmin in an ideal position.

15 degree wedge - Link
Vertical Extension Plate - Link

Then I had to do a bit of extra drilling to put holes in the correct places. Anyway ...

My wife commented that she likes the Garmin for the more natural viewing position. I agree. On our final 4 hour trip back to SF, I mostly ignored the Tesla navigation and just monitored the arrival SoC estimate. I also found myself using the speedometer on the Garmin more than the Tesla one off to the side. All benefits of being right in front of you.

For supercharging stops specifically, the Tesla nav is better for getting you to the actual supercharger once you're in the actual vicinity. You already want to enter the supercharger into the native nav specifically for preconditioning, so this isn't much of a surprise to anyone, but just mentioning it.

The last experiment I'm planning on is installing the BC 40 wireless camera as a front parking camera, paired with the DriveSmart. If it does what I want, it should make tight parking situations much more manageable ... not only for me, but for my wife as well. Would be a huge bonus, in my opinion, to remedy what is a major oversight on the Model Y.

 

[Occhis]

Have any pics of the completed installation?

 

[LostVector]

Have any pics of the completed installation?

Yep, here's just a few. It's hard to get a great angle but you get the idea.

 

[Occhis]

Haven’t use my Garmin for a few years. How up to date are the Garmin maps compared to Tesla NAV, Google maps, Apple Maps?

 

[hmadsen]

So yes … I know it’s a first world problem, but the built in nav is just a little short of where I want it to be … so I’ve been considering throwing in a Garmin Drivesmart GPS?

Pros to the Tesla Nav
Built in range estimates
Integration with supercharger network

Cons to the Tesla Nav
stalls up without connectivity (I park in a underground garage)
Too many unnamed roads
Lane guidance comes very late and is not consistently available

Nav on my phone is much better, but offline is still not great and if I need to quickly check something for whatever reason, I’m having to multitask on the phone which I really do not want to do when driving.

So I’m thinking maybe a Garmin could be an improvement? Even tho there are clunky aspects to the software, it’s still a pretty customizable interface with many years in the Sat Nav space. The smaller model might even serve as a reasonable instrument cluster in the Y.

Thoughts?

I dont even think the feature where it tells you where you should charge on a longer trip makes sense most of the time.

We drove from Scandinavia to Italy, and we quickly ended up just deciding when to charge ourselves.

I would more than once suggest we go to a 150 KW charger site, that was nearly full (So basically a 75 KW charger site) with the battery SOT at arrival at 20ish %, when there were a 250 KW site which was constantly as we drove to it, less than 75% full, and we would arrive with a SOT of below 10%

Also it did not seem to care that some of that suggested charging spots were 2-3 miles away from the motorway, whereas others that was also reachable was a lot closer.

As said, we totally disregarded it's suggestions most of the time, and when we came nearer to the one it suggested my wife (passenger seat) wouldzoom out and look at Tesla charger locations and if they were reachable but with lower SOT than the one it suggested we would chose that one (With a heavy favoring of 250 KW chargers as priority 1)

Honestly i would have thought it worked better than it actually did, i am sure we would have arrived at our destination if we just blindly followed it's suggestions, but i bet we saved atleast a an hour or more because we had fewer, longer stops.

It seems Tesla does not at ALL factor in the extra time to exit the motorway, drive for X amount of miles and so on, when they suggest chargers, and sadly it also seems they have put chargers "too far" away from the motorway in a lot of spots.

Having to drive 2 miles away from the motorway and 2 miles to get onto it again, that is easily 10-15 minutes and the chargers are also often placed at the farthest end of the spots they have them at (Mall parking lot and so on.)

 

[Occhis]

@LostVector, You got my nerd juices flowing, so I dug out my old nuvi 3597 from the bottom of a storage bin. Looks about the same size as yours. Updated the software and maps, and am diving into your experiment. The unit fits in a Tesla-specific phone mount I already have, though I had to adjust the steering wheel several inches higher in order to center it. Routing the power cord to the 12v plug in the console is not ideal, but I’ll see how it all works out.

 

[richguy]

i live in the mountains. gps will mostly work, except when on single lane road with trees or cliffs on both sides. a really good garmin will show more roads,
but updates slowly.

 

[LostVector]

Haven’t use my Garmin for a few years. How up to date are the Garmin maps compared to Tesla NAV, Google maps, Apple Maps?

Can't complain, but I don't think I'm equipped to parse the fine details on this point. I can easily imagine Google or Apple Maps might be more up to date, but this hasn't affected my driving in any way yet.

I dont even think the feature where it tells you where you should charge on a longer trip makes sense most of the time.

We drove from Scandinavia to Italy, and we quickly ended up just deciding when to charge ourselves.

I would more than once suggest we go to a 150 KW charger site, that was nearly full (So basically a 75 KW charger site) with the battery SOT at arrival at 20ish %, when there were a 250 KW site which was constantly as we drove to it, less than 75% full, and we would arrive with a SOT of below 10%

Also it did not seem to care that some of that suggested charging spots were 2-3 miles away from the motorway, whereas others that was also reachable was a lot closer.

As said, we totally disregarded it's suggestions most of the time, and when we came nearer to the one it suggested my wife (passenger seat) wouldzoom out and look at Tesla charger locations and if they were reachable but with lower SOT than the one it suggested we would chose that one (With a heavy favoring of 250 KW chargers as priority 1)

Honestly i would have thought it worked better than it actually did, i am sure we would have arrived at our destination if we just blindly followed it's suggestions, but i bet we saved atleast a an hour or more because we had fewer, longer stops.

It seems Tesla does not at ALL factor in the extra time to exit the motorway, drive for X amount of miles and so on, when they suggest chargers, and sadly it also seems they have put chargers "too far" away from the motorway in a lot of spots.

Having to drive 2 miles away from the motorway and 2 miles to get onto it again, that is easily 10-15 minutes and the chargers are also often placed at the farthest end of the spots they have them at (Mall parking lot and so on.)

In our case all stops have actually been on our route, so no complaints yet on that front. Your experience would certainly be annoying. I recall that the supercharger routing algorithm tries to distribute drivers across superchargers, so what looks optimal in isolation may have other factors that cause the nav system to route you differently.

@LostVector, You got my nerd juices flowing, so I dug out my old nuvi 3597 from the bottom of a storage bin. Looks about the same size as yours. Updated the software and maps, and am diving into your experiment. The unit fits in a Tesla-specific phone mount I already have, though I had to adjust the steering wheel several inches higher in order to center it. Routing the power cord to the 12v plug in the console is not ideal, but I’ll see how it all works out.

Curious to see how it goes for you! It might be overkill for some, but so far I'm positive about the experience.