Looking for a GPS tracking solution

Hi all,

I have two fleet vehicles that I would like to be able to actively track. I am usually out and about in a third vehicle, and here's what I'm looking for: a system that will allow me to put transmitters in the fleet vehicles, and use a laptop in my truck (or other third device) to keep tabs on their locations, in real-time. We work in a lot of rural areas and cellular signals can be kind of spotty, so air cards are basically a no-go.

I was looking at some of the geocaching devices for a bit, but I wasn't sure if anything like that would work... and I would prefer that others besides myself didn't have easy access to know where the other two vehicles are.

Any advice? I'm sure something like this has to exist...

The inability to use cellular for the communication is the showstopper.

If you could use air cards there are a number of solutions on the internet, like GPSGate.

For the two other vehicles you could use the tracking function of something like SPOT II. It sends the position data via satellite, so as long as there is a good view of the sky there's a decent chance you'll have fairly current location data. But the catch here, again, is you still need an internet link in your vehicle to access the internet for the position information transmitted from the truck.

I'm not sure if there is a totally satellite-based solution.

...ken...

If you use the phrase vehicle tracking satellite in your favorite search engine you'll get lots of hits. You might get a lead or some ideas there.

...ken...

Thanks for your help, Ken. After doing a bit more research, I can see why the cellular is necessary... this info has been a huge help to me. I appreciate it!