The pretty much traditional AL Trip
Melissa and I are heading to AL on a visit with the family this weekend. We are leaving after I get off work tonight (5/20) and should be back in town on Sunday (5/24). First, the really cool (at least I think) thing we will be doing this trip is using Trapster to allow almost live tracking. Here are the 2 links:
I’m actually pretty proud of the kit we will be using on this trip. Gone are the days of the inverter, power trip, computer speakers and tons of cable that we have been using for the past few trips. Now primary power will come from the two 12v jacks in the dashboard. I finally fixed the one that blew a fuse 2 or 3 trips ago. I also got a iPhone/Aux input working for the Jeep, so no more computer speakers on the dash to watch DVDs with. One 12v jack will power the DVD player, the other will be used by an iPhone charger that has a spare USB port on it so you can charge 2 at once if you wanted to. I wouldn’t even need the extra charger if it weren’t for a audio issue I ran into. There is an impedance mismatch if you have an iPhone and another stereo device. Fixing it won’t be too hard, just making a circuit with some resistors, but I did not have time before the trip.
Trapster is a really cool iPhone app that is kind of like a social network for speed traps. But I’m not actually using it for that exact purpose. It’s a nice heads up, but I’m more interested in the way it can do tracking. With the links above you can watch our progress as long as the app is running and we are in an area with cell tower coverage. Chances are there will be some gaps in the trip when I change iPhone songs. Sure its got some limitations but its pretty neat overall!
So check my Twitter for trip updates, and check out the above links to watch our progress. Ill report on how it all works out when I get back!
