Track grades

careful we don't end up with an over complicated system that isnt straight forward to interpret... i think that's why a lot of systems just use an adjective, like hard or difficult or good fitness required...

you can link a topomap to the track on the topomap.co.nz website, search for the track or feature in the middle of it, then copy the permalink no one will be in any doubt as to the steepnesss of the terrain http://www.topomap.co.nz/NZTopoMap/nz26258/Aoraki%2fMount%20Cook/Canterbury

Yes I agree, but to me it just becomes more confusing and ambiguous if trying to smudge together several properties which to me don't seem to go well together. It's just a suggestion in any case. I think most of what Matthew's proposed makes a lot of sense.

Like matthews suggestion. don' like combined grades. Imagine I have a steep-as well marked track. Is it easy coz no navigational/technical skill is required? Or is it hard coz if you're not fit you won't get there in a day? Simplify by separating the criteria - as per Matthew's proposal.

How do you feel about Matthew's item 3 for fitness grading?

I feel pretty good about it. :) Another way to handle the fitness or exertion grade would be to look at height gained and distance covered rather than hours walked. Time is rather subjective.

Most European guide books to hiking in say, the Swiss Alps, have distance and height gain/lost as well as expected time taken. Without a GPS its a mystery to me how some people generate their distances and altitude changes, they can vary greatly from simply counting the topo lines on the map.

Well, barometric altimeters are much more accurate for elevation than GPSs as long as the weather's consistent, and they've been around much longer. I think elevation measurements from typical outdoor consumer GPS devices are usually only accurate to within about 30 metres, unless something's changed recently, but it's the reason why many GPSs that target the outdoor adventure market will also include a barometric altimeter. Sometimes I'm skeptical of GPS-measured distances too, unless the data was gathered and analysed very carefully and objectively. GPSs measure points, not continuous lines, and distances are often calculated by adding together the straight-line distances between each measured position along a route. A GPS that's measuring positions every 30 seconds could easily come up with a distance much shorter than a GPS that's measuring positions every 3 seconds, because the latter will have much more left/right variation along what the first would consider a perfectly straight stretch between two points. There's also the possible error of potentially several metres for every measured position. Anyone who's looked at the recorded track of a typical trampey GPS if it's left stationary in the top of a pack for 45 minutes under a shelter while eating lunch will have seen how easily a GPS track can dance all over the vicinity in that time.

dont think the gps elevation matters that much in a locator beacon, what matters is the accuracy of the latitude and longditude to pin point the location and they are pretty spot on with that

No the elevation wouldn't matter much in a locator beacon.