Garmin inReach Mini review, a visit from CG. Update from Garmin.

I was planning to post a review of my Garmin inReach Mini and after a visit from the Coast Guard out on the ocean yesterday, seems like a good time. 
Bottom line- I love my inReach Mini and carry it on outings and road trips, it has earned a place on my PFD, between my CKRT knife and radio.



Background- I added an inReach to my safety/communication gear in June 2020 because, no surprise to most of you, roaming around the forests, remote beaches, and water on and off the coast of Oregon (plus CA, WA, and AK), a cell phone signal is often not available. The inReach uses the Iridium satellite network to send and receive short messages (SMS texts) at any location on Earth where you have some line of sight to the sky (opening in forest). The inReach mini does not have text input but it can Bluetooth to a phone and allow normal back and forth texting using their Earthmate app. The messages the inReach sends include the GPS coordinates and a link that takes you right to a map showing the location the message was sent from. It also has an SOS button that connects to the Garmin emergency center. They try to communicate with you and also contact the appropriate emergency services, providing them with the GPS location that the SOS was sent from. The inReach units can do many more things, but those are why I carry one.

Subscription- I have the $12/month subscription that provides the SOS service, unlimited 'pre-loaded' messages per month, 10 regular text messages per month (more than 10 are $0.50 each). 

Pre-loaded Messages- You get to format 3 of these on your on-line account, designate as many e-mails/phone numbers as you want each sent to, and then 'sync' them into your device. Unlimited free each month!

It's easy to imagine how useful this can be, each can have multiple meanings, here is what we came up with:

#1:  "On/Off the water, all good".  First time- everything according to plan, at expected location (water, beach, forest, river bank), starting outing.  Second time- done with outing, back to car...

#2: this is my universal "whatever I'm doing, big objective achieved" message- lingcod, salmon, steelhead, razor clam limit, lots of crab...on a good day, I get to send this one more than once. 

#3: "Car trouble, no signal, going to need your help, more info coming".  this lets my wife know that I've got a problem, can't contact AAA myself, and when I get the phone/bluetooth connection working, I'll send more details.  Not intended to be an SOS but 'there is a problem'.

Results: until yesterday, my inReach worked perfectly, the battery life is well more than a day, messages send relatively quickly, and it 'chirps' when the message send is completed, so you just hit send and go back to what you are doing.  The Earthmate app on my Android phone works great, back and forth messaging is just like normal texting. Bluetooth connection between phone and inReach can be a pain but I think that's more on the phone side of things, connects automatically for a few months, then needs a "forget and reconnect" sort of thing.

March 18, 2023- leaving Sunset Bay at 9am, heading for Simpson Reef with Pepper on the back of the Outback (her 11th ocean outing!), I sent message #1 to let my wife know I was on plan. An hour later, after dropping my crab pots, I joined the armada of boats out bottom fishing and got ready to drop a Lancers jig, when North Bend CG made a 'pan-pan' call that my radio cut off before the details.  Then a PB near me called out "hey, I think the CG are looking for you- 60yo guy on a lime green kayak".  I shouted back something like "that doesn't make sense, plus I'm 61". lol

Within a few minutes, one of those big CG 'Star Destroyer' boats is cruising towards the reef and I get on the radio to figure out what's going on.  They are looking for me, so I hit the jets and head for them and it turns out, the inReach sent message #3 to my wife in error. My wife and son (who was visiting for the weekend) discussed what to do and in the end, decided something might be wrong and the best thing was to just call the CG in CoosBay and let them know an unexpected message had come from me. Communications with CG were amazing, they kick ass and she was able to relay my exact float plan, from where I would be parked at the Sunset Bay day use area, that I was going to Simpson Reef, had an 80# dog on the kayak with me, wearing a dry suit and green PFD, launching 9am, back 3pm (4pm at the latest)...CG got back to her that they actually had a boat out in the area (probably checking the bar) that could head over to Simpson and confirm I was fine. CG also sent a mobile unit to locate my rig in the parking lot, confirming it was there and kayak was not.  On the water, I chatted with them for a few minutes, we all agreed that Pepper and I were not in distress but should get back to putting some lingcod onto the kayak. They also called my wife right away and let her know all was well (besides me still needing to catch some fish).

The US Coast Guard are an amazing team of talented and dedicated people. 



Did I send the wrong message at 9am?  no.  The default is message #1 and it requires pushing a down arrow button on the other side of the unit twice to move to message 3.  there were more errors later in the day- first lingcod retained, I sent message #2, she got that correctly.  second lingcod retained, I sent message #2 again, but she got message #1.  Further, the messages were not going to all the recipients. There is either something wrong with my unit or at Garmin.  I contacted them today, they opened a case to figure out what happened and had me upload the log file from the unit. I will post an update to this thread when the issue is resolved.

Summary- I love my inReach mini, the only issue I have had was yesterday with pre-loaded messaging and not the critical SOS function. No surprise to our kayak fishing community, the Coast Guard are consistently awesome and take very seriously even the possibility that someone on the water is in danger.         



   

Thanks for the run down.  I've been thinking about buying one. 

I'm interested in your report on Garmin's analysis of the logs.

Thanks for the run down.  I've been thinking about buying one. 

I'm interested in your report on Garmin's analysis of the logs.

I just got in an ACR Bivy Stick for the BCS this year

I had the old Spot 3, and upgraded to the Spot X - which is hauntingly similar to a blackberry and I figured would be useful in a richer user interface.

Well, it ain't.

1. It is damned near impossible to tell when SpotX has delivered a message, or even confirm that it has been successfully sent - that is, received by the satellite and in Spot's hands.
2. The user interface is about what you would expect was developed by someone who has never used a computer before. Dreadful.
3. Its connectivity is more off than on. I don't know if it is the unit itself/antenna, or the fact that it doesn't use Iridium; it is on a different set of satellites.

Bottom line, I got both a SpotX and an Inreach Mini and left them both active for a year, using both - often to send the same messages. Spot X is the loser, Inreach the winner.

I don't fool with pre-written messages. I just use it from my phone and text away. When I am adventuring, IDGAF about per message charges. I care about the message and I won't miss the extra $3 that month.

I have yet to use it from the water - in that setting it is really just an SOS or not situation, for me.

However, I do a lot of offroading, rock crawling, and overlanding plus solo camping and hunting. And it keeps Mrs. P happy.

I had a catastrophic mechanical failure at 3500' elevation in the snow, at night, in the coast range. I was able to text for help (I wasn't alone, but somebody needed to grab some parts and tools). Several hours later, a mechanic friend showed up with a replacement steering gear box and we did the install on the trail. I was very glad to have the ability to freeform text, at will.

Inreach. Get one.

Thanks for the insight on the Garmin IRM I too got one, actually for Christmas in 2019 and didn't realize how much I would use it, of course early 2020 it didn't get a ton of usage but since I have used it quite a bit to communicate with family and even some friends as well. I will say that while my experience has been mostly good you can't count on it for extremely **Timely** messages, in that I had tried to communicate with a buddy who also has an inreach and it took way too long to communicate back and forth the extent that it wasn't useful in that case. I will say that simply informing my wife of my whereabouts and safety it is fantastic and invaluable. Fortunately I haven't needed the SOS functionality but I am confident that it would work well in the event I needed it.

I don't fool with pre-written messages. I just use it from my phone and text away. When I am adventuring, IDGAF about per message charges. I care about the message and I won't miss the extra $3 that month.

I have yet to use it from the water - in that setting it is really just an SOS or not situation, for me.

here's where the very simple Mini and pre-loaded are so useful- Mini has 5 buttons- Action and Back (right side) and Up and Down (left side) plus Power (top).

you can see mine hanging there on my PFD, it's tiny and to send pre-loaded #1 takes a few seconds, goes like this:

Action- screen- "Send Preset?"
Action- screen- Preset #1 is displayed.
Action- screen- "Send"
Action- screen (often)- "Poor GPS Strength"
Action- screen- "Wait for GPS"
Action

that's it, not like I stop pedaling or fishing or spend time looking at the screen. Push the Action button 5 or 6 times and message #1 is sent.

I can use the Arrow buttons to change to a different Present and at 'Wait for GPS' the down arrow changes it to 'Send Now' (which is what I normally do since I'm just sending update messages).

Then, to do normal texting, bluetooth to my phone, open Earthmate app and it is absolutely the normal phone text interface that we all use all the time, it accesses all your contacts, shows the message threads, normal texting. The Mini just lets you do it where the phone isn't getting a signal. 

cheers, roger   
 

Thanks for the insight on the Garmin IRM I too got one, actually for Christmas in 2019 and didn't realize how much I would use it, of course early 2020 it didn't get a ton of usage but since I have used it quite a bit to communicate with family and even some friends as well. I will say that while my experience has been mostly good you can't count on it for extremely **Timely** messages, in that I had tried to communicate with a buddy who also has an inreach and it took way too long to communicate back and forth the extent that it wasn't useful in that case. I will say that simply informing my wife of my whereabouts and safety it is fantastic and invaluable. Fortunately I haven't needed the SOS functionality but I am confident that it would work well in the event I needed it.

Yeah, roundtrip isn't seconds/instant like we are used to with SMS, but I was getting responses in under 2 minutes, which in my situation was perfectly cromulent.

I will also say that when I had a Spot 3, I also had their roadside assistance, and my truck went into limp mode. I wanted to use the program, but had no way to know if they were coming, what the ETA was, or any way to tell them what help I needed. I finally got to where I had signal, and was able to look up the hotline number and called THAT. And found it would be about 4-6 hours before a tow truck got to me.

Not a knock on the service, but rather a commentary on the need for 2-way communication with any of these assistance programs, including - and perhaps especially - in an SOS situation.

Great report/review Roger!

-Mark-

Wow, great information and report! I'll be really curious to hear what Garmin has to say about the wrong message sending - that is obviously hugely concerning.

I just got the Garmin InReach Mini 2 for Christmas and have been acclimating to it. I have, so far, only used it to send my track to my wife or friends when I'm off grid or on the water. Folks seem to enjoy watching my track live throughout the day. I haven't used the messaging yet. My primary use cases/needs are: SOS capability (the core reason for it), live tracking (fun), and lastly, messaging.

I had freshly charged it Saturday, turned it on when I started fishing and turned on tracking mode, put it in my PFD, forgot about it for 6 hours, and then turned it off - and it said it was at 97% battery. I don't know if that's accurate or not, but if so that is pretty amazing battery life considering that it is talking to satellites every 10 minutes (the interval for my live tracking).

When I haven't had any signal strength issues so far. It takes about 60 seconds for the tracking webpage to update after my new position is sent each time.

My brother has one of the older InReach units and has been similarly happy with it.

Thanks for the run down.  I've been thinking about buying one. 

I'm interested in your report on Garmin's analysis of the logs.

I just got in an ACR Bivy Stick for the BCS this year

Now if I could just convince myself to launch out of Hewitt I might have a shot at that great prize. 

Before the inReach Mini cam out, I shopped the larger inReach and went with the Spot mostly for the size.  Ran with that for a year or so until Spot hit me with a $300 annual auto renewal.  Couldn’t cancel it so I let that renewal run out the year.  In the meantime the mini came along rpand that’s been my go to beacon since then.

I take it in my briefcase when traveling on business and of course on the solo backpack or week+ long solo hunts.  I have similar check in messages but I accept if something goes wrong I’ll pay the per message surcharge for custom messages, or if something cool happens in the back country.

Very good to have it and is part of my level 1 gear that stays on my body if possible, or high on my pack.  I don’t leave it on all the time so the battery can hold on for a week.

Update:  Garmin support got back to me after reviewing the internal data file from my unit, I also sent them screenshots from the units message log and the e-mails that my wife received. Their conclusion is that the unit was and is working correctly and I agree. 

Applying Occam's razor, it seems that despite sending hundreds of these preloaded messages correctly over the past 2.5years, and despite good conditions (I wasn't wearing gloves or in a hurry...), I must have activated the Up Arrow button (on the left side) as part of pushing the Action button (on the right side), which changed message #1 to #3.

The second part was that my wife, after discussing with our son, decided to go ahead and call CG as part of being extra cautious.  Message #3 was never intended to be an emergency SOS message and would not be in the future.

Item 3, that led to the CG boat visiting us, was that my radio started having static/squelch issues on Yaquina Bay just 2 days before this.  I heard the start of the North Bend 'Pan-Pan' call but it went to static before I heard the details of the call. Had I received the full radio message, I could have called into the CoosBay Tower and let them know I was fine but still looking for my  lingcod.   

Summary-  Garmin support was outstanding and my inReach Mini is working correctly.  I'm glad the CG boat was already out in the area and didn't need to make a special trip, they are the best.

     

Thanks for the update.

Someone mentioned the Garmin Montana 700i. I took a look at it. $700-800, but it seems to be a total stand alone package.  This is gonna go on the list of budgeted items we feel we need.

I'd had early Spot models, and honestly after using them, wasn't as impressed as I enthusiastically claimed when I first got them... this might be a different story.