nuvi 650 detour

What do you mean it won't let you? Just do it.. It's not like it's holding the steering wheel and refuses to let you turn it. Once you detour, the GPS will catch up and recalculate the route.

I'm wondering what is the significant difference between just going where you want and having the unit Recalculate in 5 seconds as soon as it sees that you left the route versus going where you want and hitting the Detour button when you decide to take a different way. What does that Detour button actually do besides trigger an immediate Recalculate? My Nuvi 350 only seems insistent on returning me to the original route when the original route is indeed significantly "better" than the way I just turned.

your funny like when someone falls down a flight of stairs funny,,not that I hope that happens to you...

What i was asking was on my old garmin when u hit detour there was an option detour by road...

I'm glad that you appreciated the humor...not that I was trying to make you laugh.

My understanding of the detour feature is that it immediately takes the first available road off of your current route, or indicates that you must do a U-turn if there isn't one coming up within a certain distance. It then tries to get you back onto your main route as soon as possible. It automatically recalculates the best way around a blocked road and does not give you the option of selecting a way to go. If the new route it blocked it will try again. It differs from just veering off course and recalculating because it sends you a direction that will actually work. If you veer off the wrong way and wait for a recalculate you've got a good chance of just having to U turn because the road you chose doesn't return to the route.

If you want to be able to fine tune routes to put your own custom detours in you need a unit that supports multiple waypoints per route. I specifically purchased the nuvi 750 to get the advanced routing features (and spoken street names).

Thank you very much, that was helpfull.....

I'm not sure that's right. I experimented today on the way to work and I think that hitting the Detour button is the equivalent of setting an Avoidance for the road that you are on. It will then compute a new route by anything except the road you were on when you selected Detour. I agree that it will take the very first opportunity to get you off the current road, even if it does not make sense as far as most effecient travel is concerned.

I have a straight shot to work on the tollway for 15 miles straight east. I hit Detour while on the tollway, and it told me to leave the tollway at every opportunity. I stayed on the tollway and it told me to get off at each exit along the way and then recalculated each time when I did not. I checked each route after each recalculation and it never tried to put me back on the tollway even though each suggested route was longer and slower. It was doing what I told it - to get off the route that I was on.

That's pretty close to my experience with the detour button. So I go back to my original point: If you are trying to simply avoid an accident or a traffic jam, why would you not just drive off somewhere and let it recalculate your route back somewhere else? Supposedly it's already chosen the best route based on your selected settings so when a minor deviation is done to get around a problem, the logical thing to happen next would be to get back to the selected route once the issue has passed. If you really don't want to use the original route anymore but still want to end up at the same destination, eventually the GPS will calculate a new route once it determines that it makes no sense to return to the original one.

I don't see a use for the detour thingy unless you can tell it where you want to detour to.

Actually I've just done a RTFM: Here is what the manual for the n350 states:

"If a road on your route is closed, you can take a detour:

1. With a route active, touch MENU.

2. Touch DETOUR."

Looks like you're right and it will prevent selection of that specific road from that point forward.

Thanks for the clarification. If it never lets you back on the same road that is a little weird. In my area the roads are short enough that I didn't notice that behavior.

Hit the detour again and it will put you back the old route.

I was driving back from Sedona, AZ to Dana Point and when I came to the 215/91 interchange, as usual, there was a terrible tie up. I chose to stay on the 215 to the next exit and then get off at the next exit. My desire was to have the Nuvi route me back to the 91 somewhere past the jam. Instead, no matter what I did, it kept sending me back to exactly where I started out, at the start of the jam.

I was a bit familiar with the area, but not enough to easily do my own bypass routing, so I drove all over the place, trying to get back onto the westbound 91.

This has to be the most aggravating issue that there could be, when you are depending on your GPS to expedite your trip.

It seems that some other models have this ability, including some lesser priced models. Since this appears to be a major issue that many users have complained about, I wonder why Garmin hasn't addressed it?

But, as I always say, "that's just my opinion, I could be wrong."

GeneL

I have pressed detour two times and it took me on another route different from A or B. But I have also had it take me back to the A route as well sometimes.