First and foremost there are a few various tracking sites that will keep the location of your device for you, most cost, usually a set up fee and then monthly costs and so on. I wasn't too keen on paying large chunks of money for very little data that will be transmitted. Eventually I came across a free and essentially open source site that not only tracks for you but provides the software the little old phones (and newer ones) track along with the how to set the phones up.
The site I am speaking of is called InstaMapper. They have a wealth of knowledge for getting the initial steps started in creating this for yourself, along with a FAQ for any problems that may arise.
They have a few pages that you should read through fully should you decide to make one of these for yourself including:
How It Works
Features
Compatible Phones
A Demo
The How To's
The FAQs
I will also point out that the iDEN series phones are the cheapest route, and if you're making this for cheap it would be good to have something semi disposable should the bike actually get stolen and not recovered, which brings me to my next part.
Every state is different when it comes to how you can pursue recovery of your own possessions. Most police will take you up on your offer of helping them by providing a GPS tracking device, you'll probably get a strange look at first but if they're like to police here they would love to jump on an easy to solve case like such. I've proposed this idea to a couple officer friends of mine here in Orlando and they both said it would be an amazing thing to see and use should my bike ever be taken.
I'm almost secretly hoping to myself that one day my bike does get jacked just so I can put this to use, in the mean time it is nice to see the statistics that are logged such as speed, altitude, and just the lines on the map of where all you've been. The (Google) map that is provided on the site also can be exported and shared if you wanted to do as I've said in a previous post about the Glympse app and share where you are with family and friends for either safety or just meeting up with some one.
As I've said earlier I have been testing this little phone I purchased for a good amount of time now and I'm absolutely thrilled with how it works. I've left it in my car, my girlfriends car, and on the bike here and there just to see how accurate it is and how long I can go on just the internal phone battery. That run time will vary on how old the battery is with the phone you purchase, or if you have it plugged in via a cig cord to maintain a charge.
The cost of the phone was cheap the pre paid boost mobile plan is also very cheap, I think I pay $10 every 3 months just to maintain a balance on my prepaid sim card that's in the phone. A side note I should mention is that the data option on the activation of the phone is NOT needed. The program only uploads data, doesn't actually download data so that fifty cent charge per day is not needed. When the data option is turned off only downloads are capped, uploads are still wide open.
The nice thing about having this device being just a simple prepaid cell phone is its size, simple to hide on your bike or car, either under the seat or in a locked glove box. The phone takes very little power when plugged in via a cig cord. On my car it never made dent on my battery, even after my 2 week trip to Europe I came back and the battery charge level was virtually the same as when I left. On the bike I went a full week of no riding while the phone was plugged in and turned on before I saw a 1volt drop. Even then the bike still fired up just fine. Of course results may vary, my car and bike batteries are both about 1 year old so they still have a fair amount of stamina. The other neat feature about this gps tracker being a simple cell phone is IF your bike should be taken from your possession and you track it to a barn, shed, or someone's back yard, once you're close its as simple as calling the phone to hear it ring away at the loudest most annoying ring tone you previously set. My cop friends loved that part and said that if they heard me call my phone and it was heard ringing on someone's property that they would then have a reason to enter the property to retrieve stolen property. Keep in mind laws are different every where we all live so that option may or may not work for you.
I decided to loosely install my little phone under the seat on my bike in the glove box area in the tail section. I already had an aux power line run back there for the trickle charger so it was just a matter of buying a cig cord adapter that connected into that and plugged the phone and its charger in from there. Being out in the open like that and not covered by mass amounts of metal gave me excellent reception. Even inside my garage with the door closed I had enough of a location lock that I could pinpoint my bikes location. Again, results may vary based on how many satellites are in your sky, and if the device is in a large metal shed. At least if it does loose the connection, either gps or cell reception, the site will still show you its last location and heading. The application is not very customizable and there isn't much of a reason to change anything on it as it slows its reporting down or up based on speed/distance on it's last reporting. So if it is sitting all day in one spot it will slow down how many times it reports, or if its flying down the free way at 100mph it will start churning out reports much quicker for better tracking.
Enough reading for now though, here's the pics!
Here's the Motorola i425 iDEN phone I used and a silicon sleeve accessory I bought for it to guard against vibration, heat, and moisture.
This is just a cheap generic usb cig cord charger that powers the phone along with it's internal battery.
Here is the aux power line adapter that I used to plug into my already existing line for my trickle charger to my bike's battery.
Should you decide to mount the phone else where or on different bike entirely radio shack sell's project boxes that fit it nicely. Only downfall to them is taking all 4 screws off to access the phone if you want to power it off and on. I decided not to use it and simply store it under the seat.
Here's mine just loosely placed under the seat in the storage area in the tail section. Now it's much more hidden up in the storage area that should a thief get a hold of my bike AND look under the seat they will really have to hunt for this to find it.
Because these phones are getting older now, new batteries are no longer made as far as I know, so in my hunting for accessories I bought a few batteries for it and tested them all to see which one else out the longest. Most thieves are not smart enough to pull the battery from the bike but if they did, at least the phone will do it's best to report its location as long as it can off its own battery (usually 1-2 days for me.)
Here's some links to where you can get the same items I purchased.
Phone (eBay)
Boost Mobile Sim Card Kit (eBay)
Extra Batteries
Cig Cord Charger
Silicone Sleeve
Cig Cord Adapter*
Project Box
*The cig cord adapter can still be used even if you do not have a battery tender set up, simply cut the end off and use the wires to directly wire the female cig cord adapter to the battery, a 5amp fuse would be a good idea to add in as well, and keep in mind if you hard wire it, center is positive on the inside of the adapter.
Enjoy guys....
