In Vietnam, there are 45 million motorbikes on a population of 100 million people. Every day bikes got stolen. If my motorbike ever gets stolen, I want to challenge myself to retrieve it. Hence the reason why I have installed a GPS tracker. 

For my neighbor, I have installed a GPS-tracker in his Honda Airblade motorbike. To share my steps, I have made a youtube video about this process. 

At that moment, I had the idea to start a GPS installation service. I even made a Facebook page. But the longer I thought about it. The more I realize that installing a GPS is only a tiny step. All the support will be another. For example, all the users are responsible for their data plan. 

In the summer of 2009, I received the question from the Facebook user Jozef Škunta (Skuntaj@gmail.com +421911512123 from Trenčín, Slovakia). He wants to know how you can follow more than one GPS tracker on the same map. We had long phone-calls were he shared his wishes. He gave me the assignment to research this. Of course, he would compensate me for all my work. But after I had shared my research, he stopped responding. I have accepted my loss. Today I found time to share those steps on my blog.

The following steps are for the Banggood iMars GPS tracker.

Step 1 – Prepare the GPS-tracker

1. Get a sim card with a provider that is offering a 2G network. More and more providers are disconnecting their 2G network in favor of 4G and 5G;
2. Activate on the sim card a data plan. My GPS tracker uses a 200 MB a month plan that costs 40 Eurocent every month. Still overkill because the tracker is hardly using more than 50MB every month;
3. Write down the phone number of the sim card;
4. Write down the device ID on the side of the enclosure;
5. Better be safe. Install an electrical fuse in the cable if you install the tracker straight on the vehicle battery.

Step 2 – Install the GPS tracker in your vehicle

Choose a location in the vehicle with a clear view of the sky. Make sure that there aren’t any engine combustion electronics nearby that location. It can interfere with the GPS and GSM signal. Install the GPS tracker straight on the vehicle battery. So it stays powered even when the vehicle is powered off. Wait a couple of minutes till all the notification LEDs are telling that you receive the GPS signal and have a GSM network connection. Now close the tracker’s enclosure.

Step 3 – Test if the tracker is working 

there are several methods to test if the tracker is working

1. Call the phone number of the GPS tracker. You will receive moments later a text message with the location. 
2. Send a text message “WHERE,123456#” to the tracker. (123456# is the password). A correct response will be a text message with the location. 
3. Use the website http://en.aika168.com. Login with the device ID and the password. 
4. Use the phone app. The device ID and the password are the login credentials.

Step 4 – Make an account on the GPSwox website.

Make an account on the GPSwox website. If you want to track only one GPS tracker, you can choose the free plan.  

Step 5 – Write down the GPSWOX server IP-number

When you log in on the GPSWOX website, you can choose three locations in the world. Choose the nearest server you will use. Write down the IP number of this server. You need this IP number later in the process. 

Step 6 – Check the status of the GPS tracker

Try to find out the status of the GPS tracker. With your phone, you send a text message containing the command “CXZT” to the phone number of the GPS tracker. 

CXZT

If the tracker is working correctly, it will return the following information.

XM_GT09_SW_23.0 2017/09/13
ID:81**************
IP:24.aika168.com 8185
BAT:4
APN:CMNET
GPS:A-10-6
GSM:31
ICCID:8984011208122218533F

You can see the device ID in this list. (the same number on the enclosure) Behind IP is mentioned the aika168 server. This address has to be changed if you want to use this tracker with GPSWOX. Write down the old IP. You can reverse the configuration if you’re not satisfied with GPSWOX 

Step 7 – Change the IP address in the tracker to GPSWOX

You have the GPSWOX IP address. you also need the correct port number. A search for iMars returns the value 6013. GPSWOX has documented this on their website:  https://www.gpswox.com/en/supported-gps-trackers 

• IP: 209.58.168.101
• port: 6013

I send this information in a text message to the GPS tracker with the following command: 

IP 209.58.168.101 6013

I got the response:

set IP OK

Now I send the “CXZT” commando again to double-check if the configuration was a success. 

XM_GT09_SW_23.0 2017/09/13
ID:81************
IP:209.58.168.101 6013
BAT:4
APN:CMNET
GPS:V-11-0
GSM:31
ICCID:8984011208122218533F

You can see that the address behind IP has changed. 

Step 9 – GPSWOX needs to recognize your tracker. 

Login on the GPSWOX website. You will find on the left side an area where you can add trackers. Here you type the GPS tracker’s ID number. My ID number is 81************. If nothing is happening, then the tracker is in sleep mode. Move your vehicle to wake the tracker up. 

If you have correctly followed every step, you will see the vehicle’s location on GPSWOX’s website. 

With some analytical and creative thinking, my information is also handy for the configuration of other brands. Use the manual to find out how to configure the IP address. On the Banggood forum, I have discovered that there are four different versions of the iMars tracker. The CXZT commando informed me that I own the GT09 version and I should use that manual. Understand that I have written this blog post with the GT09 version of the iMars Banggood tracker. There is a chance that you are using another version. 

If you want to roll back to the previous configuration? Simple send 

IP 24.aika168.com 8185

to the GPS tracker so that it can communicate with the aika168 servers