Thread: Vehicle Tracking

lo/jack

Check my posts here:
http://www.mp3car.com/cgi-bin/ultima...c&f=2&t=002487

Feel free to ask...

Dimitris

you'd have to really hide it...if i saw an mp3 player in a car (assuming i stole a car) i'd seriously investigate it.

Hiding it is not a problem. I want something that will be standalone. I mean if you get something that plugs into your computer, wouldn't the computer have to be on in order for you to get coordinates of your car? What kind of theif would turn on your computer?

A while back I saw a device where you connect a phone line (a cell phone in our case) and dial into it from any phone somewhere else, and turn on the PC. Now that sounds reasonable...but just connecting a device VIA serial port, and leaving it at that? What's the point in that?!

This system I described has nothing to do with a computer in the car for the reasons you just mentioned. In fact a computer in the car is not needed at all.
All the in-car components of the setup (cell phone, GPS receiver, Tinytrack) are small enough to be hidden (camouflagged) in a box of tissues under the rear window (that's what I did), or somewhere in the engine compartment, under the car, under the spare tire etc... Just make sure that the GPS receiver's antenna has a decent view of the sky (unless your receiver has a detachable external antenna).

Dimitris

Since a lot of people are asking over e-mail information on this, I am posting what I wrote in a reply.

What you need is:

In the car
1) An old cell phone (with auto answer mode)
2) A modified hands-free harness for the particular cell phone
3) A Tinytrack (version I or II)(www.byonics.com)
4) A NMEA GPS receiver

At home
1) A PC with soundcard
2) The appropriate software (AGW and WinAPRS or UI-View)
3) A phone line and a normal phone appliance
4) A cable that (you 'll have to solder it yourself) connects the phone's speaker to the soundcard's line in.

The Tinytrack board basicaly converts the NMEA serial data from the GPS into sound that can be transmitted by any means. In this case we use the cell phone. The Tinytrack's output is connected to the cell phone through a modified hands-free harness (cut away the mic and solder the wires to Tinytrack's output). The cell phone is set to auto answer mode, ie whenever somebody calls to this phone, it's picking up the call autommaticaly without the need to press a button.
When you are at home and call the cell in the car, the sound (coded data) comes from the home phone's speaker, through a cable to the soundcard's line in and then the software decodes this data and shows your car's exact location (longitude, latitude), speed, bearing and elevation (with TT II) on a moving map. The scale and detail of the map depends on the map you 'll scan and import to the program.
I suggest you use a SIM card in the phone with a unique phone number that only you will know and use only for this reason (not to accept voice phone calls). It should be one of those prepaid credit connections in order to avoid the monthly fees (since this phone will only accept incoming calls whenever you want to track your car and not to make outgoing calls).

I started work on a project that a year ago to track my car, but I haven’t done any thing with it in about a year. Here's how it works: http://www.whereismycar.org/about.asp

It works pretty well I can get my cars’ location and map just by going to that site which is even acceptable from WAP enabled cell phones.

A demo is here: http://www.whereismycar.org/demo.asp

Ziplock,

you still need a computer in the car and it's much more complicated!