Orienteering, Climbing & Rambling Instruments

Walking Pedometers, Bearing Compasses, Map Measurers and Beyond!

This page briefly describes the instruments used in many outdoor activities from Rambling to Mountaineering. These include the various types of Walking Pedometers, Compasses, Map Measurers , Measuring Wheels and Altimeters available from Pedometers International Limited.

Bearing Compasses and Chart Compasses: There are a wide variety of charting and bearing compasses to choose. Bearing compasses start from the basic devices to comprehensive bearing compasses with inclinometers and mirrors to assist with accurate positioning and height measurement. With bearing compasses, you really do get what you pay for. Professional/expert bearing compasses are extremely robust, often made from brass and an absolute pleasure to use. Lower cost models tend to have much fewer facilities and are generally made from lower quality materials.

Walking Pedometerss add another dimension to the orienteer's knowledge of their position and basic information. These devices give an accurate measurement of the distance covered and thereby, allowing for terrain, the experienced user can be fairly sure of their position on the route and the distance they need to travel to the next waypoints. Walking Pedometers are also extremely useful in helping the orienteer to benchmark their performance by giving them fairly accurate measurements of actual distance traversed, rather than the flat measure provided by GPS.

• Measuring Wheel Pedometer - is the type you may see a road surveyor using and looks like a wheel on a stick. As the Measuring Wheel turns, it accurately traces the distance traversed
• Walking Pedometer - is designed with the characteristics of a walker/hiker in mind. Unlike the Measuring Wheel, it has no contact with the ground
• Jogging Pedometer - is designed for the jogger and will generally have faster performance than the Walking Pedometer (and more convenient than a Measuring Wheel!)
• Running Pedometer - for the runner and can cope with the higher speed and stride of the runner

Walking Pedometers like all Pedometers, being independent of any external factors (such as GPS signals) work just as well in mountain passes and indeed below the dense woodland cover which tends to render GPS of little if any use. Ideally, the best accurate measurement of tracked distance is a Measuring Wheel, and these can be used to plan routes accurately. However, these are somewhat imprctical for the orienteer.

Map Measurers: These lightweight Map Measuring devices measure the actual track distance across a map, and are calibrated to the popular scales that are in common use. Simply set the map measurer to zero and roll its small wheel along the actual route on the map to get the distance of the planned path. Map Measurers can be very useful if used in combination with Walking Pedometers, especially in calculating the distance along winding paths. By reading off the distance traversed on the Walking Pedometer and rolling the map measurer along the route, a very accurate position can be achieved.

Altimeters: Altimeters measure height above sea level, or more accurately they measure air pressure. They are effected by air density on the day and a good altimeter will allow the orienteer to correct for this using air meteorological reports. These add the final dimension in providing an accurate vertical fix on the orienteer's position. Unlike GPS, which has some altitude abilities, the altimeter is lightweight and does not need clear horizons in which to receive sufficient signal for altitude readings.