Yet Another Cycling Forum
General Category => The Knowledge => GPS => Topic started by: andyoxon on 25 August, 2021, 10:36:29 pm
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I have used this site in the main... http://garmin.openstreetmap.nl/ but it seems to have been down for a while (massive jobs queue).
Any alternative free routable options?
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Try extract.bbbike.org (http://extract.bbbike.org) and use the "latin1" format as the UTF-8 does not work on some Garmins
Of course if people won't "donate" for these "free" services the sites eventually die as the operators can't cover costs.
PS I know nothing of etrex and its map capacity but have used the bbbike "onroad" format previously as it creates much smaller map files (or covers a larger area) by eliminating "street labels" (names) and "land cover" and a secondary benefit is that the maps are much clearer and uncluttered.
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Thanks. My elderly Etrex Vista HCx can only have one map loaded at once (4Gb card), but does have map declutter options. Download size limit/ area covered on BBB seems a little limited. e.g. Wales & some of England hits limit. My last download of whole of UK (~500Mb zip) was in 2019 - so not too old. Don't really need contouring.
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I use this for whole countries on my eTrex30: http://www.freizeitkarte-osm.de/garmin/en/index.html
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500-600 MB should be enough for whole of UK if the maps aren’t too cluttered.
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https://shop.talkytoaster.me.uk/maps
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I'm using the free maps from here with success https://free.talkytoaster.me.uk/
You need two downloads, one is for the GPS unit and one is for MapSource or Basecamp.
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I have used this site in the main... http://garmin.openstreetmap.nl/ but it seems to have been down for a while (massive jobs queue).
Any alternative free routable options?
Hmm that's a shame.
If you 'select a country' Europe/UK that gives a long list of links to all the UK tiles, you can then download them individually (eg I'm only interested in the dozen or so tiles around my home area). They appear to be dated June 2020. The tiles download as numbered .img files and in general terms related numbers will be related tiles geographically.
I can then use MapSet ToolKit to construct these tiles into a single Mapsource map, and from Mapsource import into an old Etrex Vista that I don't use for anything else.
The end result is a gmapsupp.img file that I can (optionally) rename and copy to any other Garmin. All pretty arcane stuff I know. Let's hope there's a better way.
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OpenFietsMap is quite nice. Seems to be updated fairly regularly, latest version from April 2021. It includes height data and contour lines.
https://www.openfietsmap.nl/home
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I have used this site in the main... http://garmin.openstreetmap.nl/ but it seems to have been down for a while (massive jobs queue).
Any alternative free routable options?
Hmm that's a shame.
If you 'select a country' Europe/UK that gives a long list of links to all the UK tiles, you can then download them individually (eg I'm only interested in the dozen or so tiles around my home area). They appear to be dated June 2020. The tiles download as numbered .img files and in general terms related numbers will be related tiles geographically.
I can then use MapSet ToolKit to construct these tiles into a single Mapsource map, and from Mapsource import into an old Etrex Vista that I don't use for anything else.
The end result is a gmapsupp.img file that I can (optionally) rename and copy to any other Garmin. All pretty arcane stuff I know. Let's hope there's a better way.
I use Mapuploader 6 together Typwiz 4 for styling the map elements. It can take the latest raw osm data and automatically put it in Mapsource / Basecamp (they share registry entries so if installed in one the maps appear in the other) and img files for your Garmin.
Again pretty arcane but once setup I only need to download latest osm data for the regions I’m interested in. At the moment that’s European continent plus UK / Ireland. My latest Uk / Ireland was updated end of July 21.
Does mean I have the maps showing and zooming exactly how I want them with no clutter that is useless on a small GPS screen
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Thanks. My elderly Etrex Vista HCx can only have one map loaded at once (4Gb card)
This isn't strictly true, but you do have to perform some data-wrangling (I've recycled the neurons) to combine multiple maps into a single .img file.
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Thanks. My elderly Etrex Vista HCx can only have one map loaded at once (4Gb card)
This isn't strictly true, but you do have to perform some data-wrangling (I've recycled the neurons) to combine multiple maps into a single .img file.
Isn't only one named map (mapsupp.img? can't remember) so you can load as many maps as will fit but with a usable identifier for unused as yet 'spare' maps that won't clash with the in use one. So UK is as it needs to be named, then France has FR appended and spain, italy, wherever labelled somehow. So then you just append uk to the uk map as you leave these fabled shores, then in calais remove the fr bit to use that map, then rinse and repeat the process as you cross borders.
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Thanks. My elderly Etrex Vista HCx can only have one map loaded at once (4Gb card)
This isn't strictly true, but you do have to perform some data-wrangling (I've recycled the neurons) to combine multiple maps into a single .img file.
Isn't only one named map (mapsupp.img? can't remember) so you can load as many maps as will fit but with a usable identifier for unused as yet 'spare' maps that won't clash with the in use one. So UK is as it needs to be named, then France has FR appended and spain, italy, wherever labelled somehow. So then you just append uk to the uk map as you leave these fabled shores, then in calais remove the fr bit to use that map, then rinse and repeat the process as you cross borders.
You can do that, but I've got maps combined into a single .img file to get around the single filename limitation. You need some sort of map-building tool.
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Combining several maps, from varied sources, covering disparate or overlapping geographies, into a single .img file is simple to do within good old Mapsource.
Where maps within a single .img overlap they can still be switched on and off individually, within the GPS device (thinking of an old Etrex for example).
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Thanks all. Fairynuff, re. combining maps. At the moment only really need UK as a single download.
Combining several maps, from varied sources, covering disparate or overlapping geographies, into a single .img file is simple to do within good old Mapsource.
Where maps within a single .img overlap they can still be switched on and off individually, within the GPS device (thinking of an old Etrex for example).
Be interested in how to do this - for future reference. :)
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...At the moment only really need UK as a single download...
http://www.freizeitkarte-osm.de/garmin/en/more-countries.html
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...At the moment only really need UK as a single download...
http://www.freizeitkarte-osm.de/garmin/en/more-countries.html
Cheers.
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I've just downloaded the UK and Ireland from https://www.openfietsmap.nl/
Would love a way to download their lite version though. The regular seems, visually, too much for my little Garmin. Much prefer the simpler version.
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Combining several maps, from varied sources, covering disparate or overlapping geographies, into a single .img file is simple to do within good old Mapsource.
Where maps within a single .img overlap they can still be switched on and off individually, within the GPS device (thinking of an old Etrex for example).
Be interested in how to do this - for future reference. :)
Sorry, missed that. It's as simple as point-and-click.
Various map products from Garmin (at least, those of a certain age) and downloadable map images from eg OSM can all be installed in Mapsource and become available under View/Switch to Product or from a dropdown list in the toolbar. You can for example have a Route or Track loaded ans simply switch between maps in this way.
Whichever map is displayed, you can select multiple map tiles using Tools/Map or the Map Tool in the toolbar. Your selections don't have to be contiguous. You can then export the selected mapset to your (old) Garmin using Transfer/Send to Device. If its a big mapset it takes forever (USB 1). Mapsource plays best with old Etrexes I find, so I have an old Vista on the desk that I use for this and nothing else. The gmapsupp.img file once transferred can be used in any other Garmin, and can, depending on model, be renamed.
With some map tiles already selected, you can switch to another map and continue to select tiles. These can overlap your existing selections (which you can't now see, but they are still selected) - eg, UK contours, or UK OSM vs UK Metroguide, etc. Or they can be in completely different parts of the world - eg, UK Garmin mapping around home and Heathrow, then OSM mapping in India. You can swap maps and select tiles as much as you like, all selections are retained. You can even save the total multi-layer selection as a GDB file if you wish (this is not essential). You can then export the selected (combined) mapset to your (old) Garmin using Transfer/Send to Device. There are limits, on total size and number of tiles, but they are very high and you are very unlikely to encounter them, given the slow speed of transfer you'd probably die of old age first.
On the Garmin, the imported map data is a single gmapsupp.img file. On older models, you are limited to this one file, on newer models you can have multiple .img files by renaming them. Where maps overlap, how they display depends on how they were compiled in the first place (there is a stacking order, and a transparency property, neither of which you have any control over by this stage) and on the peculiarities of your model of Garmin. But on old Etrexes that can only use a single .img file, individual map tiles can be shown or hidden, and tiles also group by map name and can be shown/hidden in this way. on newer Etrexes none of this is necesary - you just use lots of single-map .img files instead.
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I can add that maps installed in Mapsource show in Basecamp and vice versa. Having both products installled.