Ride Planner
Novice
Joined: Sep 2008
Posts: 16
Likes: 2
I've used Harley Ride Planner mostly for about 10 years now and like it the best. I use Rever's online tool for the Butler Maps subscription, but ultimately I find Harley's tool the best.
I think ultimately it depends on your GPS and how it routes. I have used Garmins throughout the years and they all do their own routing and don't handle the basecamp and Rever tracks very well. Basecamp tracks are great as long as I follow it exactly. Once I deviate from the route, my Garmin recalculates and routes me there on the quickest route.
Using the Harley Ride plan, you set your destinations first. Each destination is a separate route in my Garmin so an entire ride might end up be several routes. Then throw in some waypoints to force the Garmin to route your preferred route.
After I load the GPX into the Garmin I then compare the Garmin route to the Ride Plan route because ultimately Garmin just plans the quickest route following all the destinations and waypoints in order. If you look at the GPX (change the extension to xml) you'll see what I mean. If you find a deviation, just go in and add more waypoints. In Garmin the waypoints show up as via points and the destinations show up as the start/finish of each route. So if you route Point A to B to C with waypoints in between, you'll end up with 2 routes in your Garmin (A to B, and B to C).
Also Google can throw you off because it's "smart" and knows about seasonal closures. So planning your summer trip to Colorado in February can be quite a challenge because Harley Ride Plan wants to route you around all the seasonal road closures. Routing in Rever fixes that because you can set the travel date. Google/Harley lets you set your travel dates, but it totally ignores them when planning the route. It thinks you're leaving today.
I think ultimately it depends on your GPS and how it routes. I have used Garmins throughout the years and they all do their own routing and don't handle the basecamp and Rever tracks very well. Basecamp tracks are great as long as I follow it exactly. Once I deviate from the route, my Garmin recalculates and routes me there on the quickest route.
Using the Harley Ride plan, you set your destinations first. Each destination is a separate route in my Garmin so an entire ride might end up be several routes. Then throw in some waypoints to force the Garmin to route your preferred route.
After I load the GPX into the Garmin I then compare the Garmin route to the Ride Plan route because ultimately Garmin just plans the quickest route following all the destinations and waypoints in order. If you look at the GPX (change the extension to xml) you'll see what I mean. If you find a deviation, just go in and add more waypoints. In Garmin the waypoints show up as via points and the destinations show up as the start/finish of each route. So if you route Point A to B to C with waypoints in between, you'll end up with 2 routes in your Garmin (A to B, and B to C).
Also Google can throw you off because it's "smart" and knows about seasonal closures. So planning your summer trip to Colorado in February can be quite a challenge because Harley Ride Plan wants to route you around all the seasonal road closures. Routing in Rever fixes that because you can set the travel date. Google/Harley lets you set your travel dates, but it totally ignores them when planning the route. It thinks you're leaving today.
Grand HDF Member
Joined: Mar 2011
Posts: 4,816
Likes: 1,320
From: Good roads, cold beer
that makes 3 of us lol
Grand HDF Member
Joined: Mar 2011
Posts: 4,816
Likes: 1,320
From: Good roads, cold beer
with Mapsourse (pre Basecamp) this was never an issue on my 2610. Newer technology was coded differently for some reason.
Novice
Joined: Sep 2008
Posts: 16
Likes: 2
Yeah the older Garmins had a setting that would override the recalculation. My NuviCam, sadly, does not. It makes tracks pretty much useless.
Advanced
Joined: Mar 2008
Posts: 50
Likes: 6
From: Peterborough, UK
I'm using a product called MyRoute-app these days for my route planning. It's a European product but is based on Google Maps so covers the USA. It's a good product with facilities to store multiple routes. It has some great features like being able to compare a route with that of TomTom and Garmin (Here maps) - this highlights differences between routes so that extra waypoints can be added if required. It's also got a reverse route feature and lots of additional goodies for route planners. MyRoute-app is cloud based too so I can access my routes when I'm on the road with my cell phone and tablet.
MyRoute-app even has a "Save as Harley Davidson .gpx route" feature which works on my Ultra Limited system.
There's 2 versions of the tool - a free (limited feature version) and a Gold full feature version. I like the product so much that I've subscribed to the Gold version.
I have a short YouTube video showing how I use a combination of Google Maps and MyRoute-app - the video is at
MyRoute-app can be found at https://www.myrouteapp.com
It's worth a look!
Neil
MyRoute-app even has a "Save as Harley Davidson .gpx route" feature which works on my Ultra Limited system.
There's 2 versions of the tool - a free (limited feature version) and a Gold full feature version. I like the product so much that I've subscribed to the Gold version.
I have a short YouTube video showing how I use a combination of Google Maps and MyRoute-app - the video is at
MyRoute-app can be found at https://www.myrouteapp.com
It's worth a look!
Neil
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