Category: Garmin

Now I know there are a lot of you out there that don’t like the training centre. It’s partly Garmins fault as the base map is so poor. It becomes a whole lot better when you purchase one of the Mapsource products.

Well for the thrifty out there, there may be another option. Garmin have just released an upgraded version of the package that ties in with the new Forerunner 50 and the forthcoming Edge 605/705.

One of the facilities it has is the export of your ride to Google Earth.
Now I’m heavily into Google Maps and didn’t want to download Google Earth as well after a disaster with the beta version but I took the plunge.

I’m glad I did, its a good halfway point for those that don’t want to purchase a Mapsource product. I decided to take a look at a local ride up to Tesco,s to get my copy of Cycling Weekly. The detail is stunning, you can see where I have took a shortcut around the cash machine and parked the bike in the cycle rack and then ridden around the carpark.

It also means you don’t have to export your rides to MotionBased to re-export them on another format.

The next thing I want to try is to do a Course on the Training Centre with the MapSource map. This would be using the Garmin inbuilt icons rather than using waypoint naming.

Some months later 26 Apr 08
I now run the latest version of the Training Centre that supports the Edge 305, Edge 705 and the Forerunner 50.  There is a bug in the Course planning page that only allows you to use the generic icon and not the turn icons. I’m hoping Course Points don’t have a 100 waypoint limit but haven’t got around to researching it yet. I wouldn’t mind swapping a few of the oddball ones for more direction based ones. 
Anyone know what the Course Point limit is.
03 May 08 Missed an update to the TrainingCentre that deals with the Generic Icon issue also had a reply to the Course Point limit question. You are not limited to 100 CoursePoints so you could literally use hundreds of them on a course. This would give you the bleeps for the turns. I’m going to try a Course with CoursePoints ride it and do a comparison with a Route.

12 Nov 08 CoursePoints are the way to go, all the advantages of waypoints but without the 100 waypoint limit.  TrainingCentre is the only Garmin product to allow you to edit them and you need a Garmin Map rather than the basemap. BikeRouteToaster.com allows you to edit CoursePoints in Google maps and I would highly reccomend it.

Just bought a Garmin City Select V7 map off ebay for 99p plus £4 postage. The difference it makes over the Training Centre base map I’ll post when it arrives but anything is an improvement on the basemap.
All this is in preparation for the release of the Edge 705. The way things are going I’m going to want the power option on it too. That’s getting off the subject a little but there are cheap Garmin maps out there if you don’t need the latest version.
You can download Mapsource for free but it comes alive when you put a map into it.
Once you get anything other than the base map into the TrainingCentre it really opens up the package. The Course editor can actually be put to some use.

I don’t know how Garmin are going to cope with editing Courses but Mapsource doesn’t do Edge courses. You can have 13,000 points in a Course but only 100 waypoints in a Route. It is vitally important that you know the difference between the two as it can alter your whole perception of what an Edge can do.

5 November checked with the seller that it was in the post which he assured me it was. 
6 November Item arrives but only problem is that is an update on 3 cd,s and you need a previous version to update. Caveat Emptor. Still what do you want for 99p plus postage.  The item was as described so it’s down to my lack of product knowledge.

8 December  I’ve now got 3 mapsource maps in training centre and they are all pretty much the same. Unlock codes are out there if you know how to word your search. Just do a bit of research if you are bidding on an item that needs an unlock code.  Upgrade disks are purely that they need an an unlock code from a previous version. Once you’ve got a registered product your laughing.
This needn’t cost the earth don’t forget all those Nuvi owners out there are getting the same maps in their units for free. Or is it the other way round, the units are free you just pay for the IP rights on the maps. Whichever way it is there are millions of them and few of us.

On a couple of occasions the Edge has appended the days ride to a previous days ride for no good reason. The MotionBased forum has suggested that it is the user not pressing stop at the end of the ride. Now I always press stop at the end of the ride or at a Cafe stop so that didn’t seem to be the reason.

Last night I went out for another ride. Looking at the distance still being 59 miles from the other days ride it finally struck me as to what was going on. The GPS system relies on accurate timing. As far as I know the Edge has no internal clock. When you fire your Edge up from cold it has to aquire all this information from the satellites.
Now I can get a bit impatient waiting for it to aquire the satellite and this I think has been my undoing. Pressing start before the Edge has aquired the satellites leads it into thinking the data is going to be appended on to your last ride. The Edge doesn’t know the time yet as it is still trying to locate the satellites for your position.

The answer to the problem is wait for the Edge to locate the satellites and then press start to log your ride. It’s far easier to wait that extra minute than uploading your ride into Sporttracks and splitting your ride in there and exporting it back into the TrainingCentre or MotionBased.

When the new Garmin Edge 605 and 705 arrive Edge users are going to have to get to grips with Garmin Mapsource maps.
As the 205 and 305 are not mapping GPS units it means the new 605 and 705 owners are going to have an even steeper learning curve to climb.

None of the Garmin 705 bundles I’ve looked at come with a map other than a basemap. Garmin basemaps are about as much use as a chocolate teapot. I suspect they are included to stop you throwing the thing at the wall out of frustration.

Garmin maps are not cheap, the retail price for Topo GB 2 is £150 which when added to the price of your shiny new Edge 705 is a lot of money. I mention Mapsource Topo GB as it is Garmins Ordnance Survey equivalent and if your a mountain biker this is the product you are going to need. Roadies (moi) can use the other maps such as Metro or City Select. All these products can be obtained substantially cheaper on the net or on Ebay. I paid £18 for my copy of Metro Europe V6 so all though not the current version  was worth it just to update the Training Centre software map.

You cannot export the raster based Ordnance Survey digital mapping based maps to a Garmin only Routes and in the case of Tracklogs, Courses.

You can download the Mapsource program for free from Garmin.

http://www8.garmin.com/support/download_details.jsp?id=209

As you have a basemap with your Edge it will install and at least you will get to see the functionality of the program.

I’ll update this post as I learn more.

This is a link to Pauls blog about buying an Edge off Ebay.
As you can see he got his for a bargain price.

http://sidsjourney.blogspot.com/2007/07/winning-on-ebay-at-right-price.html#links

I used a similar tactic to get one of the Garmin Mapsource Metro maps.
Edge 205 and 305,s are starting to be discounted now with the new 605 and 705 due any day now so you shouldn’t be paying full price for an Edge.

Just as we are all getting to grips with MotionBased Garmin has announced the new site will be called Garmin Connect.

http://www8.garmin.com/pressroom/outdoor/082907.html

This anouncement totally slipped by me as I was preoccupied with the Edge 705 anouncement. Hope it doesn’t change too much and the old links work as I now have over 70 rides on MotionBased.
I suppose it had to come as I don’t really use the Trailnetworks side and I don’t look at any of the running routes.
The Forerunner 50 sounds quite good value at $99 . This is going to give Polar a very hard time. Some of their basic models are close to that and don’t have gps on them.

The twelve hour battery life of the Garmin Edge 205/305 is a shortcoming that needs addressing if you do daylong rides such as Audaxes and the like. There are a few options out there similar to the emergency mobile phone chargers such as Cellboost and PowerMonkey etc and the Homebrew route that I tried.

Part of the problem when your Edge gets down to one blob of battery life is recharging it on the move. On the Audaxes time was a bit tight in the control points and the Edge doesn’t recharge in 5 minutes. You dread seeing a low battery warning after 100 of 125 miles I can tell you.

My Edge is mounted on the stem but there is also a clearance problem with USB connector. Its a tight fit and any pressure on the cable means the Edge won’t take a charge. This tight fit rules out the use once Emergency Mobile phone packs like CellBoost (£5 at Tesco,s). Riding colleague and Garmin route planning mentor Ray has a pack from Akhter that works that cost him about £20 I’ve been told, it gets put in a pouch that gets looped onto the handlebar. His setup works but I still like the Heath Robinson efforts that abound.

There are two methods of regulating the voltage to your Edge charger first is the step down method. You start with a higher voltage and drop it down to 5v through a regulator . The excess voltage generates heat and is not efficient. It’s easy to do though and the parts are cheap. Cheap enough for the Cellboost pack to be thrown away.

The other method is DC-DC conversion. This is what I think is in the more expensive chargers like Ray,s. This is the blood out of a stone method and is more efficient than the step down method. Without going in to too much detail it allows you to extract all the energy out of a set of cells to top up your Edge. You can quite literally charge your Edge from a single AA cell.

The Energiser Energi to Go charger looks like it might work Ok . I might end up getting one instead of faffing around but where would be the fun in that.

To be continued. The solution is out there.
Mustn’t forget to mention Andy Walshes charger from Poundland. Cost need you ask £1. Battery under the seat, with a switch. He completed a 12 hour Race with it.

MK 2 battery pack is coming up with a 5 volt regulator in it. Been to Maplins for the bits.

Fabricated the Regulator side of the charger into a PP3 cell top. Then potted it in Araldite. The regulator is a 78s05 5volt regulator that I’v had since the days when I used to do computer repairs. I bought a 6 x AA cell battery pack from Maplins whech should supply 7.2 v if fitted with Nicads or Ni-Mh batteries. All thats required now is to fit the mini USB plug to cable and test it.

A 7805 voltage regulator needs around 6 volts before the regulation starts to suffer and is good for 1 amp of current on a heatsink. One final word of warning Nicads and Ni-Mh batteries generate large currents when shorted due to having next to no internal resistance. Take care to insulate any exposed metal or you could end up with more than a melted jersey like I did.  If you’ve poor soldering skills don’t attempt to solder a mini USB connector.

The Edge is quite a hungry beastie drawing 380 mA from the PSU falling back to 190 mA after an hour. The regulator draws 4 mA without the Edge connected so it would eventually flatten the batteries if left connected.

Like I have mentioned before the Edge USB port is a very tight squeeze when the Edge is mounted on the stem. The Madone is fitted with an oversize stem and the Maplin USB connector just comes in to cantact with it. It is going to need a bit of adjustment to make it foolproof.

Next project is likely to be a LED headlight unit. The price of the LEDs must be at a level where it is cheap enough to play around with them.

Next test: Field trials.

The field trials in the Discovering Shropshire Audax went fairly well but they weren’t the full onbike trial. The Edge was down to two blobs by the final control and a 15 minute or so charge put another blob back on the battery charge indicator. The exposed part of the 7805 regulator is hot to the touch but these are robust devices incorporating various methods of protection. I also used the pack to charge up the mobile phone on the way home as it is also fitted with a mini USB connector.
Cost without rechargeable batteries is around £2.50. The regulator was in the junk box.

Maplin Part Number

L53AZ USB 2.0 Mini Plug 5p   £1.79
HQ01B 6AA Battery Box            74p
UJ54J  L78S05CV  2A reg           77p

Or if you’ve no soldering skills don’t posses a soldering ironyou could try one of these for £1.99

http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=99657&doy=3m10

Edge 705 update. Not going to be available until 1st Quarter 2008 !!!!!!