Garmin GPSmap 182 - outstanding features and reliability

The Reason for my Purchase
I fish the ocean in the Pacific Northwest from April to September. The ocean is often rough and the weather damp, an environmental condition that is hard on electronics. Electronics failures I’d encountered include corrosion, UV damage to screens, broken plastic mounts and key pads, and broken seals. And, of course, there are always the firmware bugs that result in unpredictable failures. For me, it has been rare for any electronics to survive more than two seasons.

The Garmin GPSmap 182 was old technology when I bought the unit three seasons ago and Garmin states this model is out of production. I should have reviewed this model sooner but it takes a while to know if I really like something this complex. My unit has survived very well and shows no sign of deterioration. I am very happy with this model’s rugged construction and durable connectors. Further, the nitrogen seal has remained in tact and the screen is showing no degradation. I would expect the new GPSmap 192C to be at least as durable as its predecessor.

I upgraded to this model to get the WAAS feature. Without the correction provided by WAAS it is difficult to pinpoint rocky reefs where fish can be found and to provide sufficient warning of structure to save the terminal tackle. Older units seemed to over correct for random drift of the reported location but it also caused incorrect readings when drifting in slow current or wind. The Garmin performs wonderfully in every situation important to me.

My Use of Waypoints
The standard marine maps are intended for navigation and most of my important fishing structures are not reported on these maps because they’re not navigation hazards. So, building a database of fishing locations is important to me and I use waypoints to define an outline of important structure. (I would highly value the ability to add contour lines to the map from my own experience rather than use waypoints.)

Waypoints are stored in alphanumeric order. The standard search starts at the first and continues in order until the desired waypoint is found. This is very tedious when you have a lot of waypoints as I do. The feature to display nearby waypoints is a good idea but it fails for me because it displays only one screen of data and does not scroll to other nearby waypoints. Garmin recommends one use the map to find nearby waypoints. I find I have to zoom out, move the cursor, zoom in, and to select a way point I find this requires full attention and have to stop to select the next waypoint this way.

I have five favorite ports and find that I have to use two characters of the waypoint name to represent the waypoints associated with a harbor. With only 8 characters to display a unique name for a waypoint, the names are sometimes too cryptic.

It is tedious work to enter a waypoint using the key pad and rocker. I purchased the serial port cable to attach the unit to my laptop back in port. MAPsource PC interface is very good and an essential part of owning one of these units. I build all my data bases with the PC and redo any waypoints set while fishing with the PC. And, one can easily upgrade the firmware which is absolutely necessary for a navigation aid.

My Use of Routes
Staying legal now requires one to honor exclusion zones. The unit has this wonderful feature of drawing lines on the map but it only works for routes. I used routes to define a route for a zone and select the route to display the lines. That way I can see the boundaries and stay in legal fishing water. (A feature to add lines to the map would be really great!)

Using the Interface
The display options are well though out and configurable. I have a favored set to running and another for fishing. And, the display is very readable even in sunlight. However, the depth readings on the maps are hard coded so one can not change the size. The only time I need reading glasses is to read the depth from the contour lines on the map. I especially like having the time-to-destination display which gives very positive feedback to keep on a straight line course as opposed to a curved course typical with side wind or current.

The map scale is a definite weakness. A scale bar is displayed with tiny font identifying the distance and I find it impossible to read. I would much prefer a number that identifies the dimension of the width of the screen. Such a display would have easily given visual information about how far one was from important structure.

I use the graphing feature to record the ground covered with a drift, either to repeat a successful one or to avoid a repeat of an unsuccessful drift. The storage allocated to the track is very large and one can fish all day before “eating the tail” of the track. This saves the need for using temporary waypoints and cluttering the screen with icons.

The tide tables are very handy for crabbing or for fishing a tide change. Slack water time is not given but one gets use to the difference between slack water and tide change with experience. What I do find difficult is finding the option to display the tide table for the boat’s current location. The menu option is just not intuitive to find, even after three years of use.

The unit finds the satellites and determines its location very fast. Even when I move the boat hundreds of miles, the GPS is ready to go before I am ready to leave the dock. Older GPS units really struggled with finding the satellites when moved even a reasonable distance.

What to buy
I paid about $700 for the GPS unit. But, I also purchased the MAPsource software and one map ($140), the serial interface cable ($65), and a 32MB flash memory chip ($90). These are all Garmin proprietary products and priced like they are special. Without these accessories, the features of the unit are not fully realized.

I used the GPSmap 182C unit for a couple of days and found the color added almost no value. The color maps are nice and one has bragging rights but the $300 cost seemed high when one could not identify a single feature requiring color.

The GPSmap 192
The replacement GPS from Garmin has only a color model. The price, however, includes a built-in map for the US so one can avoid the cost of a memory chip. (Outside the US one still has to purchase a chip to load the map.) They added a FIND key which seems to address my issue of finding the correct tide table and changed the options for finding nearby waypoints. The rest of the features appear to be identical to my GPSmap 182. The current pricing for the GPSMAP 182 keeps it a very viable option, at least until the current inventory is exhausted.