Heart Rate Monitors without the chest Strap
 

What Heart Rate Monitors out there are effective but do not read from the chest. In other words any HRM that do not have the chest strap?

Do any of them read from the wrist at all etc?

What brands should i be looking at for that type of feature.

The only other ones I have seen on the wrist were not "live" units. You had to hold your fingers on the top to get a reading. Once your fingers were removed the reading turned off.

this is all I have seen also...I finally went with an inexpensive timex to go with my garmin 200 and I am very happy with the whole set-up. I thought the strap would be an issue but I don't even know its there.

This one reads your pulse from the forearm/wrist. There's a sensor on the bottom of the device that reads the pulse continuously.

http://www.amazon.com/ePulse2-Strapl...ywords=epulse2

The chest sensors read the heart's electric signalling like hospital EKG does, that's why it's difficult to measure from other parts of your body. To properly measure the pulse from your arm, you'd need to have something squeezing the arm, like when taking blood pressure.

Is there a reason why you don't like the chest strap?

I recently bought a Polar F2 and the first day the chest strap kinda bugged me but now I don't even think about it. I've worn it all day just to see how my heart rate fluctuates in different circumstances. Funny how when I'm interacting with difficult folks it will go up and when I'm just working my regular job its pretty consistently the same. My resting rate such as at lunch was much lower than I thought it would be. My commuting partner bought a Timex without the chest strap and it worked pretty well but it was dangerous to check while riding so he is taking it back to get one like mine.

what I am looking for is one without a chest strap. mostly because I do a lot of casual cycling and not many are designed for people my size :-)

I want something that will transmit its data to my droid (so bluetooth) in a format that strava will understand if thats possible.

I am stalking the my trek by scosche they are price but they read from an armband which is far more convenient and its bt but not sure if its generic IE can strava get that data or ONLY their app. ??

Yep. My wife has large, well, you know. Does the letter J mean anything to you (H in the UK)? Underwire sports bras and HRM straps do not mix. Underwire sports bras and non-chest-strap HRMs would mix.

I think Garmin chest monitor does have an extension for large guys, and in case there isn´t, you can always find a clever way to extend it. I´m a doctor, not a heart doctor anyway, but i think chest monitors are better than wrist/forearm monitors, because as it was said earlier, chest bands register your heart´s activity while the wrist/forearm register your arterial pulse. There are some Arrhythmias, in which the pulse differs from the heart´s pumping activity: For example if you got some A/V blocking, half your heart is pumping at 300bpm and the rest is on 150bpm, so you´ll get a 150 bpm pulse but you auricle is actually going at 300 hundred. Maybe I´m wrong but I´d go all the way into chest register with an a mod on the strap. The strap can be changed to no matter what length or material. Find a handy lady(not those!!!) who does some good sewing and ask her for a 10 buck mod!

I am not a doctor and I am not doing doctor "things" with my heart rate so accuracy really is not all that important.

if I have a major heart problem they measuring my heart rate in general is not going to provide useful data to me making the entire issue moot.

point stands. I can say as much as I want but I know in the end I would simply stop using it for the hassle of using a chest strap.

so any data that is "gotten" reliably is better than more accurate data that is never acquired because of annoyance/laziness/aggravation of the acquisition method :-)

I don't even really "need" it. my "geek" side wants it since strava is "capable" if adding it to its data stream. its the only reason I really want it anyway. so convenience is king :-)

I am probably over 450 pounds (I stood on a 450 pound capable scale and it gave me Errr so either it was broken or I exceeded 450 pounds)

simple GETTING on the bike for an hour is sufficient for my needs. to burn fat.

I have not seen a doctor in over 10 years probably won't for another 10 years. no insurance no money.

so I just cross my fingers and hope I do it right.

Just so we are on the right track, the monitor goes under the breasts, closer to where the sternum is.


Motorola was making a wireless set of headphones for their gps watch that also too the heartrate, but they are MIA. I don't think that would be better either: What if they were crappy earbuds? Also, having earbuds in constantly because more irritating that a monitor on your chest.

Edit: It was supposed to go with their motoactv unit, but that itself appears to have been discontinued.

She's got a large belly too. The strap slides up-belly until it gets pinched amongst the sports bra.

This unit isn't out yet, but Auraware is developing a device they call the ATK. It is an anklet that syncs with your phone and provides heartrate, cadence, elevation, distance and location.

You can't buy one until Spring 2013, but you CAN sign up for the beta.

now that looks pretty sweet if its really just that little dongle. BTW the form only accepts your birthday at 33/33/3333 (formatting) anything else and it says no but won't tell you how to fix it :-)

the abject lack of any real info on the page is a bit annoying though.

Haha, sorry, the website is still fresh. We are expanding it right now (yes, we, I'm an engineer for Auraware)! Road Bike Rider is publishing an article next week on the ATK, but I'm happy to answer any questions you have.

Our web guy is adding the birthday format right now! Thanks for pointing that out.

projected price. are we talking "around" $100 or over $200 ? (rough estimate I don't expect you to have solid figures yet) just want to know if this is in the realm of feasible or a pipe dream for me :-)

is the device all in one or does it have other parts? (IE I don't want a chest strap)

will it be universal? IE any program on my phone can "access" the data such as strava for example. (I hate proprietary stuff :-) hehe

I assume it has an accelerometer inside and that is how it detects your cadence?

will it use Baro altitude or GPS altitude? reason is baro is relatively accurate while GPS alt is a crap shoot most of the time :-)

also does galaxy S series mean the Galaxy S only or does that also include the SII and SIII ? I guess that is not really that important just curious.

We are projecting it to be under $200, approximately $169.

This is all in one. Or, rather, all in two, because you need your phone with you, even if it's just in your pocket. The device is JUST an anklet or JUST a bikeshorts clip. Each box with come with a shorts clip (has to be used with tight bike shorts) and an anklet (can even be used for running! we have that in our app as well) and the "core" you can switch back and forth between the two depending on which you want to use at the time.

We plan for the data to be either exportable or contained in a .fit file, which is the universally used format, so, yes, you can use it with Strava. I don't know if you can use the device directly with Strava while biking (nor could I imagine why you'd want to, our interface is much nicer).

I don't want to speak component specifics without approval from my boss, but I can say that, yes, it has a barometer, so the altitude is extremely accurate.

The Galaxy S Series means any of the Galaxy S phones, included the later versions (SII and SIII).

your interface (no offense) is non existent so far and we have no idea how well it will work how open it will be and how extensive it will be. the point is strava is NOT the "on phone" interface. the point of strava is "real time" integration with your ride data. this will also simplify using programs like dashware etc.. to overlay this data with video of the ride etc..

what I would really like to see is the BT connection to the phone be "open" so any program designed as such can receive the "live" data coming from the device. ie an open API.

the reason is multi fold. if your guys interface is superior people will use it on its own merits. but some people prefer other sites (strava or myfitnesspal etc..)

I want to be sure before I spend a VERY steep $170 on such a device that I will be able to CONTINUE to use it should your company go poof (lets hope it does not)

ie customers do not like "locked up proprietary" devices. that makes devices "less valuable" :-)

I LOVE that it uses a barometer MUCH more accurate and consistent for relative altitude changes.

what other sensors does it contain? what data does it capture? resolution?

how does it detect pulse? does it have its own GPS or does it use the GPS in the phone? (IE does the phone have to have GPS while most phones do not all tablets do)

battery run time? replaceable battery?

will it have "fitbit" functionality? etc.. etc..

I will forward your opinion to our software and electrical engineers.

As mentioned, Stava will be able to use our .fit data, as well as similar sites.

It uses the GPS in the phone.

I cannot answer your other questions at this time. My apologies.

sounds good. I hope you guys get it out the door. if you need people to "beta them up" in early testing :-) let me know. maybe I can even stick it in a rocket and see what the software gets out of that :-) hehe

I understand your point and I don´t intend you to mount a ICU on your handlebar. You can make you geek side happy, but with something that really works. If you are 450 pounds (I´m 305 my self so I´m a heavy rider too), you havent been to a doctor in 10 years, and you won´t go see a doctor in another 10, you damn right need something that works, and is as confortable as possible. There´s a lot of info on heart rate areas on the web, how to train, etc!!! Good luck with your choise and tell us your experience later on!

Well, generally, heart rate monitors without chest straps are going to be less accurate than ones with chest straps. The question is simply this: how important is not having a chest strap for you relative to accuracy? If you do decide on one without a chest strap, most require you to to touch the HRM for a reading, but you are not given a continual reading. A few - very few according to my research - are both continuous readings and do not need a chest strap. Namely, the ePulse, the ePulse 2, the Scosche myTrek, and the Scosche Rhythm. I saw another one that I haven't researched as much that had very few reviews, and was something like $250.

Both the Scosches read from a device. Of the 4 only, the ePulses read from the wrist, and of those, I'd recommend the ePulse 2 because it is a newer model.

You can read about continual heart rate monitors without chest straps on my website here: http://www.heartratemonitorwithoutch...play-monitors/.

There's this one, used by swimmers: FINIS Aqua Pulse Heart Rate Monitor (links to Amazon)

-Bob

fyi, if this anklet is as good as it sounds, $170 sounds VERY reasonable, a bargain even. Just one person's opinion but in the expensive world of cycling, innovative/cutting edge products such as this generally don't come cheap.