Troubleshooting¶

This chapter lists what goes wrong during an event and what to do about it, one situation per heading. Most of them end in the same fix: press Sync at the next landmark.

GPS lost¶

The red bar under the app bar tells you what is wrong:

Bar	Meaning
Searching for GPS signal	No new position for 10 seconds while you were moving.
Poor GPS signal. Data might be inaccurate	The position is there, but its accuracy is worse than 30 m.
Location permission denied, Location services disabled	Fix with the Resolve or Enable button in the bar.

While you stand still, the bar does not say Searching for GPS signal, because a phone often stops sending positions at standstill.

Without positions the app has no distance. It carries on for about 3 seconds at your last speed, then the trip stops. The ideal time follows the clock, so you fall further behind. When the signal comes back, the distance catches up along the straight line from the last good position to the new one. In a tunnel or a long bend, the straight line is shorter than the road, so the trip is a little short.

What to do:

Keep driving the target speed. Do not chase the number while there is no signal.
When the bar goes away, press Sync at the next landmark of the roadbook (see Driving a test). After a long bad stretch, use − and + to correct the distance.
If the bar stays, move the phone to a place with a clear view of the sky.

The clock is off¶

The Rally Time in the app bar is the phone clock plus an offset that you set by tapping it. Chapter 5 sets it before the start. If you find during an event that it is wrong, tap the clock and enter the right time.

The effect depends on what uses the clock:

A Time start, a Time finish and a liaison countdown follow the clock directly.
Inside a running test, the Ideal Time compares the clock with the start time recorded earlier. If you correct the clock during the test, the Ideal Time moves by the amount of the correction. Example: the clock was 3 seconds slow when a Time start fired, so the stage started 3 seconds late against the organiser. When you fix the clock, the Ideal Time shows those 3 seconds as late. This is the true gap.
A stage started by Tap does not use the clock for its start.

Fix the clock before the start whenever you can. Do not change it in the middle of a test unless you accept that jump.

Wrong section¶

The app shows a different section from the one in the roadbook. The cause is almost always the distance, not the section.

Automatic sections. Press Sync at the landmark. It sets the trip to the roadbook boundary, and the section follows. If the trip is far off, use the Sync buttons in the top toolbar. They set the trip to the start or the end of the current section. You can also hold − or + in the bottom toolbar (100 m per step). Holding repeats the 0.1 steps slowly at first and faster the longer you hold: after 3 seconds it makes ten steps a second, so let go early and finish with taps.
Manual sections. Press Next Section to move on. To go back, use the Section button on the left of the top toolbar. The first press puts the trip at the start of the current section, if you are past it. The next press goes to the previous section, with the trip at its start.

Neither fix restarts the ideal time. See Driving a test.

Wrong turn¶

You took a wrong turn and must drive back. The trips would count the detour as progress.

As you turn round, tap Reverse in the bottom toolbar. The trips now count down while you drive back.
At the point where you went wrong, tap Reverse again. The trips count up again.
The ideal time ran on during the detour, so you are late. Recover gently, and press Sync at the next landmark.

Pressed the wrong button¶

First find out what the button did, then undo that.

You pressed	What it did	How to undo it
Next Section + Restart, Sync … + Restart, long press on Ideal Time, TC, Quick TC	Recorded a TC and restarted the ideal time.	Open Checkpoints in the top toolbar, tap the TC and tap the bin icon. See Fixing a wrong TC.
Next Section	Moved to the next section and put the trip at its start.	Section back steps to the start of the section you left, not to where you were. Use − to take the trip back, or press Sync at the next landmark.
Sync in the middle of a section	Snapped the trip to the section end, or to its start.	Hold − or + in 100 m steps (they speed up the longer you hold, so let go early), or press Sync at the next landmark.
Pause	Stopped the distance of all trips.	Press Pause again. The distance you drove while paused is lost: use + or Sync.
Finish or Stop	Ended the stage. The trips stopped counting.	Restart in the top toolbar continues the same stage, with the stopped time left out. If the car moved, press Sync at the next landmark. Read Restarting or starting again first.
Stop before the start	Cancelled the stage.	See Accidentally cancelled the stage.

Phone call during a test¶

A call does not stop the stage. The stage keeps running when another app is in front, and the Ideal Time follows the clock. Only the GPS can stop.

The setting Keep running in the background in Settings keeps the GPS running while the app is in the background. It is off by default. Turn it on before the event. With it off, the GPS can stop during a call, and the trip stops with it. After the call, open Rally Tripmeter, wait for the red bar to go away and press Sync at the next landmark.

Pause does not help: it stops the distance, but the ideal time keeps running.

App killed or phone restarted¶

The app cannot restore a running stage, because it does not save it. After a restart the app is empty: no stage, no TCs, trips at zero. Regularity | TSD shows the panel with Create a stage. The saved stages in your library are still there. The app saves a run to History only when it is finished.

To carry on:

Tap From library and pick the saved stage. The stage sheet opens with it.
If you know when the test started, set the Start signal to Time and enter that start time. The time has passed, so the app starts the stage at once and counts from the earlier time. The Ideal Time is then right.
Press Start. Then bring the distance to the roadbook position with Sync, or hold + in the bottom toolbar.
Any TCs you recorded before are gone. If you need them, add each with the Record TC icon in the Checkpoints sheet. It records the time and trip of now, so then edit its TC time and Distance to the old values.

Avoid the problem: keep the phone on a charger, do not run other heavy apps, and turn on Keep running in the background.

Accidentally cancelled the stage¶

If you tap the Ideal Time tile or Stop while a Time or Line start is waiting, the stage is cancelled and the trips are cleared. The screen goes back to the panel with Create a stage. You lose only the setup.

Tap From library and pick the stage again. The stage sheet opens with it.
Check the start time. If it has passed, the stage starts at once and counts from that time. This is what you want after a cancel.
Press Start.