dr_lha

Funny you should mention that. I bought one of these the other day:

https://www.amazon.com/VeloComputer-V.../dp/B00WFMK1TG

which can be configured as either a cadence sensor or as a hub based speed sensor, by updating the firmware. The process is a bit non-user friendly, but it does appear to work.

BTW when I bought it it was $35.

John_V 

That would be nice since they already have their RPM for cadence. I don't know why they didn't come out with one for speed at the same time?

JohnJ80

Unfortunately, I have one too. I took a flyer on it from Amazon.

It works great by itself and it can be switched from crank to hub if you do it within the first power up from the battery before it powers off (or at some time limit). But if I use a Wahoo RPM for cadence and this for hub speed they both get screwed up. I tried working with the one man band company (which I always try to support) but it took forever to get support and then I just finally gave up. Both thing thing and Wahoo use the same Nordic Semiconductor chip and I think that might be the problem. It's not like I don't understand this stuff since I'm an electrical engineer, it's just that there is a software conflict in there somewhere.

The other thing is that I found the mount to be on the flimsy side. It doesn't take much to tear the rubber and which time it could come off (especially an issue for the crank). The most robust mount is from Wahoo (tie wraps) followed by Garmin. Garmin's crank mount is just too large for my taste.

That said, I think they are on to something just not ready for prime time.

Unfortunately, I suspect they'll wind up road kill to the other bigger players in the market. Between Garmin, the power meter guys and their decreasing costs, and others like Wahoo, it's going to be really hard for a one man band to compete. Too bad. Great idea. but between competition and resources, hard to see how they survive. Maybe he can quickly sell it to someone.


I don't know either. It's a mystery to me. Seems to me they would have been most of the way there when they got the RPM cadence sensor working. Hub is just rotation in a different axis and then count the revolutions again. Wahoo is a small company too and I suspect that they were pretty buried getting the ELMNT out. That had to be a big effort for them with *lots* of software to do. When I bugged them about it at one time, they sort of hinted that they were working on the speed unit too.

All that said, I absolutely love being able to ditch the magnets for speed and cadence sensing. They have been a hassle ever since I started using some sort of electronic speed sensor decades ago. Seems I can't go a week without bumping the sensor out of alignment with those. Then double the hassle when I ride with my wife where I'm tasked with the tech support on her bike too. I'm thrilled get rid of the magnets. They are gone on all my bikes now... finally.

J.

dr_lha

Interesting. I took a punt on it because it was cheap and I was bored. So far I have only tried it by itself, and it worked fine as either a cadence sensor or a speed sensor over BLE using Cyclemeter or Wahoo Fitness app, but I can't get the damn thing to work with TrainerRoad iOS app (it works with their Mac app though). Did you post that review on Amazon about it interfering with the RPM? Seems odd that it would do that given that even if they're the same tech, BLE devices should all have unique IDs. I will try it with my broken BlueSC (that only reads cadence after it got sucked into my wheel and ripped apart), but the VeloComputer people seem to give dire warnings about having magnets on your bike, as it seems their device works by comparing against the Earth's magnetic field, rather than a accelerometer.
Yeah? I've mounted and remounted mine a few times, and the rubber seems to be holding up so far.

Out of interest how does it's size compare to the RPM?

JohnJ80

One works, I tried two or one of these and one of the RPMs. Anytime you had more than one, the whole thing got confused. That was with Cyclemeter under BTLE. I had some issues with using it as ANT+ but frankly, I didn't pursue it when I figured out that there was a conflict at that level. I wanted it to work in both BTLE and ANT+

Yep, that was me. It is odd, but what I think I was able to figure out with the ID's showing up in Cyclemeter is that there was some sort of conflict there. Apparently Wahoo had a hand in helping Cyclemeter do their speed/cadence software and it could be something in the driver side there too. That said, I tried for a couple of weeks to contact the guy via email, Facebook etc... and there was no response. I even offered to help figure it out if he'd work with me but there was no response. I finally just went to Amazon and they took it back and notified the vendor. Then he got in contact with me. At that point, I'd moved on and really didn't feel compelled to help him debug his product if the tech support was going to be that difficult. I'd already come up with a solution that worked anyhow.

Cyclemeter has no issues with any other sensor I've tried, the Wahoo Fitness RFKLT+ had no issues with ANT+ bridging of anything else. And none of my other dual sensors that are both BTLE and ANT+ in speed, cadence, speed/cadence or HRM had any issues whatsoever with Cyclemeter, Garmin or RFLKT+. It was just this thing which I *really* wanted to work.

The problem is that I think the hardware is almost identical to the Wahoo RPM. I think either the two sensors confused each other or there is some confusion at the head end. Either way, I can't debug it myself with the tools I had although the Nordic Semiconductor utility (that's how you change the personality of the VeloComputer thing) does see the Wahoo device and understands it as well but can't change it.

I think it would be fine in a single sensor environment. You may even be able to get it to work in pure ANT+ mode with multiple sensors although I could not and didn't spend the time trying to figure that out after the issues I had. I already had too much time into it and since it wouldn't work in BTLE mode with multiple sensors, it wasn't really useful to me.

That's good. I think the sensor and the mount have potential just are not ready for prime time yet. I like the carrier for the device better and think it's more trim on the rear hub. The problem is that I think the "ladder" like rubber pieces are too thin. Mine tore when I tried to put is as snug as I thought it would work. I also had it on the crank and somehow snagged it with my shoe. Either way, I think a little re-design that beefs up the latching part is called for. It would never survive on my fatbike on on my gravel bike, I think. Road bike, probably ok unless you tore it putting the bike on/off a car rack or something. Compared to the Wahoo RPM which, if you use the zip ties mount, is much more robust and solid in comparison.


They are for all intents and purposes the same size. You could mount them in each other's carriers. That's how close they are.

All in all, a great problem to have. Accelerometers are getting so cheap that the magnetic sensors are almost becoming more expensive. That's great because it means we eventually do away with all the PITA alignment issues.

J.

dr_lha

Thanks for sharing your experience. At $35 I might just stick it on my third bike as a cadence sensor (speed from GPS).

JohnJ80

That would work.

J.

dr_lha

I tried it with the BlueSC tonight. It was working until the wahoo powered up then it crapped out. So same as you found with the RPM. Basically a piece of junk. Oh well.

JohnJ80

Yeah, it's too bad. His firmware is not done right and not ready for prime time. Essentially, it's early beta firmware.

If you can, you might be able to get it to work in a setup that is only ANT+. I didn't pursue that other than for a cursory try since it wasn't the setup I was looking for.

J.

dr_lha

I would but at this time I only have devices that transmit ANT+, and none that receive it! I use a iPhone6 + RFLKT (not +) and BLE sensors on my bike.

JohnJ80

Ah. Then it's worthless to you if you need more than one sensor. I feel your pain.

J.

dr_lha

BTW I ended up buying a replacement for my broken BlueSC off Amazon for $17 (it's branded as a Scosche, but it's apparently a just a rebranded Wahoo device). I guess my dream of magnet-less speed and cadence will have to wait.

https://www.amazon.com/Scosche-Blueto...0AHDXP66?psc=1

EDIT: And I just returned the item to Amazon for a refund.

I take back what I said earlier about it working with Cyclemeter, it doesn't.

Seattle Forrest

Like I said, I'm glad I was able to help you begin to educate yourself. It's annoying when people post things here as if they were facts when those people don't know what they're talking about.

HkC01

I kept my preorder on the Elemnt, still looking forward to it hoping it's what I'm expecting for maps and recording. WRT innovation/competition... I love those LEDs. And taking a route home to rerun on my Kickr, which isn't amazing but could be dead simple.

lardo20

Wahoo's website has now moved their release date from January to March. Maybe they'll at least get the release year of 2016 correct

Drew Eckhardt 

It's likely enough I just pre-ordered one on February 5th 2016 hoping for March delivery, understanding as a software professional it could take them two days or two months to fix their bugs and ship.

Garmin's cycling computer user interfaces and bugs suggest those groups don't employ product managers who are active road cyclists.

Finishing long rides quickly requires being smart about pacing so you're fast and navigating well so you don't add extra miles; although prior to the Edge 1000 with two fields Garmin would not give you power or heart rate on a navigation screen. The ELEMNT includes up to 4 data fields on the map screen. The Joule GPS does 2, although it's breadcrumbs only without maps. Cellular phones do fine, although mine ran out of battery when I used it to drive to a ride, and I went from 40 to 5% over 40 miles being careful to turn off the gps and ridewithgps except when pulling it out for ambiguous turns.

Riding intervals the time is fixed and you only care about power and/or heart rate, although ending a lap on the Garmin only summarizes time.

My Edge 500 has always had bugs a serious cyclist would encounter, even with the final firmware version shipped years after launch. When I calibrate my PowerTap before riding but deal with other things long enough for it to sleep my Edge gets stuck on the calibration screen until power-cycled.

Jseis 

^^^^This. I use a 6+ which has excellent battery life. Also the Bt foot sensor.

dr_lha

I'm hopeful, but am willing to wait for the season to start (here April-May) before considering ordering one. Wahoo's products exactly free of software issues, just ask the many people who had issues with the RFLKT+ firmware. I have concerns with a product such as the Elemnt that has a much more complex interface/software than anything else they have produced.

I'll be looking forward to your and other reviews, but I myself am sticking with my iPhone + RFLKT solution until I see that the Elemnt proves to be a winner.

sierrabob

I just thought I would throw in my take on this discussion. Apologies if I'm stating the obvious or misreading the information, but it seems based on the Amazon post that you were attempting to transmit cadence simultaneously to more than one BLE receiver. This should not be possible with the BLE spec. You can only pair one sensor with one BLE app at a time. ANT+ allows pairing of multiple receivers with a single sensor. So you can run multiple Garmin computers simultaneously with one set of BLE/ANT+ sensors/transmitters, but you can only pair one app at a time on your BLE smartphone. Multiple apps on the same device or even two different BLE devices receiving a signal from the same BLE sensor will not work. It's a design limitation of the Bluetooth 4.0 spec.

sierrabob

Please understand that I'm only discussing the limitaton of pairing a Bluetooth LE sensor to a single receiving device. I'm not referring to bridging ANT+ signals or rebroadcast of a Bluetooth signal to another device.

JohnJ80

No, that's incorrect. I was trying to use two sensors - one configured as a cadence sensor and the other as a speed sensor. Both are allowed, should be functional, and that's how the sensor was promoted by the manufacturer. One BLE receiver only with two sensors. Both sensors transmit ANT+ simultaneously so it is possible to have one BLE receiver and one ANT+ receiver at the same time. The ANT+ receiver was there just to verify the sensor operation. Note that the result was the same with or without the ANT+ receiver.

FWIW, this set up works just fine if you replace these sensors with Wahoo sensors (where possible). Wahoo and VC use the same Nordic Semiconductor chip. From that, I think it's fair to conclude that it's the VC implementation that is bad. I wish they would fix it. I find the idea of one sensor that can be reprogrammed for hub or crank to be very attractive.

J.

dr_lha

Yep, the VC sensor just plain doesn't work. It's not helped by the fact that the manufacturers choose to blame this on other people, rather than fixing the issue.

I replaced it with a $12 Scosche speed/cadence meter which has been a champ. I still wish there was a magnetless speed meter that works with Bluetooth though.

JohnJ80

I am betting we can expect one from Wahoo Fitness shortly.

I'm really surprised that the VeloComputer guy doesn't fix his asap with Cyclemeter. He has a window here before others release a BLE accelerometer based sensor. It's closing though - he's maybe got Q1 worst case and end of Q2 best case.

J.

dr_lha

Maybe they'll release a Elemnt bundled with RPM and Speed meter.

JohnJ80

Good point. Let's hope. But, since it works with both BLE or ANT+, you could just use the Garmin hub speed sensor. Ought to work just fine. I've used the Garmin speed sensor through the RFLKT+ bridge already so I think this probably would work great. Garmin's speed sensor is good.

The Elemnt keeps getting delayed - now March. This looks really interesting to me. I like the way it takes out fields if you don't have that sensor in the system. I also like the idea that you can see where other riders are on the map. That could be very useful.

J.