Road Cycling Essentials

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Vonhelmet said:
It certainly doesn't look it, when it's set up like that, but that bike is outrageously expensive.
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Agreed, insane price! There's better and a lot more popular cheaper frames around...

Well I did it again, got sucked into the word 'sale' at wiggle again and blew nearly £100 I shouldn't have... Going from a few people's advice on here I've snapped up the cateye volt 100 (figured it was around the price I was going to pay for a set and I don't really need another rear light, just some fresh batteries for the ones I already have) and the Deuter Bike One 20L rucksack was a tempting price (had it on my wish list for months)... Thankfully I sold a few things on the MM here to help cover it! She'll never find out! ;)
 
I was looking forward to riding today but when I looked outside this morning the sky went *boom*. Now it's brilliant sunshine. Typical.
 
Jonny69 said:
I was looking forward to riding today but when I looked outside this morning the sky went *boom*. Now it's brilliant sunshine. Typical.
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yeah.. first 6 miles heavy rain.. the rest was nice and warm?! WAT.

either rain like there's no tomorrow or jizz off and gimme sun :o
 
I was crossing Southwark Bridge just as it started to rain. Fortunately I work only a few hundred metres away, so I was in the underground car park before the sky fell. Good times :)
 
grudas said:
yeah.. first 6 miles heavy rain.. the rest was nice and warm?! WAT.

either rain like there's no tomorrow or jizz off and gimme sun :o
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Yeah nothing worse than changing weather... Except possibly hot & rain! Literal Sunshine and showers suck! :(

Just a heads up (and I forgot to specifically mention it before) AVOID the Aldi Heart Rate Monitor... I got one for £23 so it was a nice cheapy way to test if I could get it working with ANT+ (no) or Bluetooth LE (no) or Bluetooth 2.0 (no). They are Crane branded HRM's and use some different technology, I didn't bother finding out more as when active the chest strap seems to interfere with my S5... The touchscreen went bazerk and fluxuated between being totally unresponsive to random screen presses and characters being spammed into any text box I had open... Also seemed to block out readings from my GSC10. Luckily I noticed this and pulled the battery before any further damage could be done. Returned for full refund. AVOID LIKE THE PLAGUE! :eek:

So I'm back to looking at HRM's and the cheapest way to implement ANT+/BTLE with IpBike on my S5... Anyone used the Wahoo Tickr? Seems about the cheapest (with decent reviews) that supports ANT+.
 
Roady said:
Just a heads up (and I forgot to specifically mention it before) AVOID the Aldi Heart Rate Monitor... I got one for £23 so it was a nice cheapy way to test if I could get it working with ANT+ (no) or Bluetooth LE (no) or Bluetooth 2.0 (no). They are Crane branded HRM's and use some different technology
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Most heart rate monitors that come bundled with the receiver/watch transmit on 5.3khz. Bluetooth and ANT+ are both 2.4Ghz so will never be able to communicate with each other.

I dont know why it would have any effect on your phone. I think it's an unregulated frequency (hence why it's used) so there must be loads of signals in that range. I cant image samsung would overlook RF shielding?
 
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And the Rapha hardshell arrived today, fits great - their sizing is so strange, had to get an XL, usually buy a medium in everything, I guess I don't have a cyclists build :S

This thing is seriously waterproof, just ran the tap over it for 10 seconds, after the water rolled off it wasn't even damp! Madness!
 
Vonhelmet said:
Get a Polar heart rate monitor. Costs about £25 on Amazon for a coded one.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Polar-92013...id=1412167180&sr=8-1&keywords=polar+t31+coded
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Reading on the Amazon comments/reviews:
sorry...does the polar t31 work with galaxy s3? thanks 16 Dec 2013
No unfortunately not. I have a Galaxy S4 and would love it if it worked with that. The Polar transmitter works with Polar watches and auto connects remotely to a lot running machines and other exercise machines you find at the gym though so that you can track your heart rate while you exercise :)
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So am I right that I need an uncoded one for it to be compatible with my android handset via ANT+/BTLE?

A "coded one", refers to a device which is coded (software controlled) to only link with certain other types of devices. An uncoded one refers to a device which will link with all types of devices
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touch said:
Most heart rate monitors that come bundled with the receiver/watch transmit on 5.3khz. Bluetooth and ANT+ are both 2.4Ghz so will never be able to communicate with each other.
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That's why I 'got it to try' (knew it was a long shot!) so I'm back to trawling the interwebs for another ;)
 
Roady said:
Reading on the Amazon comments/reviews:
So am I right that I need an uncoded one for it to be compatible with my android handset via ANT+/BTLE?
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I'm pretty sure that the poster on amazon is wrong.
A coded strap will transmit the HR data along with a code unique to that strap. This lets your phone/garmin/whatever determine which HR strap belongs to you if there are multiple straps transmitting within range.
 
That makes more sense, certainly with the principle of ANT+ (multiple devices transmitting to multiple devices).

For that price I'm kicking myself for even trying the Aldi rubbish! :D Although it doesn't actually say the protocol used on Amazon...? I'm (possibly wrongly) looking at ANT+ devices in preference over BT2.0/4.0-LE as they're lower power usage so my batteries will last longer... Then again BTLE is low power also??? Maybe I'm reading into things a little too much as batteries are cheap! (although you can't change battery on that Polar HRM!?)

Gah! Confusion reigns! Will probably leave further research until the weekend or a quiet day at work (few and far between currently).
 
Difference in power usage between Ant+ and BTLE is virtually zero.

If you plan to get a Garmin eventually then get Ant+. If you don't care about that or you don't mind replacing your sensors, get BTLE. As far as I know, coded is always a good thing.

Lots of confusing info out there but it's actually fairly simple :)
 
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