It may be because it's late and I'm dead-doggie tired and not seeing it, or it may be because it's not in the manual, but is there any way to show your average speed while actually out on a ride? All I have on my 800 is a big empty block where the average speed should be displayed. It's not until I get home and hook the 800 up to my laptop and Garmin Connect can I see my average speed.

I've gone into the menu and fiddled with settings but to no avail. I know on my Forerunner 310 I can display average speed so you'd think a more advanced device like the Edge 800 would have that capability as well.

Anyway, any help, comments, tips and/or suggestions will be appreciated. Thanks in advance.

Press on the square you want that to appear on until it turns blue. Then, when you release your finger, a list of data categories will appear. Scroll down to "speed" and pick "average".

You can add more fields by going to menu->wrench->bike settings->trading pages->user defined. And then changing the number if fields.

You can add more pages too.

You also have to press Start at the beginning of the ride to start seeing average Speed, avg Cadence, avg heart rate or average anything, as it needs a starting from which to average.

If ever a product line called out for an O'Reilly "Missing Manual," it's the Garmin Edge series.

Just MHO.

Check out Dummies Guide to the Garmin Edge 800 | Frank Kinlan's Blog for a better approximation of necessary information to use your GPS.

Really??

I do press start. It shows me all the info I want/need except the average speed.

Thanks for the information. I appreciate it. It helped get the average speed to display while out on a ride.

Fess up - what were you doing incorrectly?

There's some pretty bizarre things you can display on your 800 if you really want.

To be honest, I really don't know. All I do know is that it wasn't displaying the avg speed and now, after trying njkayaker's advice, it is.

I like the 800, but it certainly isn't the most user friendly device on the market.

In my quest to have the total ascent display on the allocated little box, I consider my failure to haven been to purchase this piece of crap.

Thanks for the link.

I am trying to figure out how to get reasonable warning on upcoming turns.

It informs me about 50 feet beforehand and at any reasonable cycling speed, this is a silly short period of time.

Is there a setting for turn notifications? Anyone?

Looigi is a good source for information about these devices! He was adding information to my answer.

People can't be sure how much information you might need. It may be better to provide too much than too little. Keep in mind, also, that extra information might help other people (even if you don't need it). So, don't take it personally.

There are two types of "turn annoucements": 1) calculated routes and 2) course points.

The annoucements for the calculated routes start at 0.1 mile to 500 feet before the turn. The announcements for "course points" occur "at" the turn.

You can change the settings for the selected course by clicking on the "wrench" before clicking on "Go".

For 1:

In the "wrench" menu, set "Turn Guidance" to "On" (this is off by default for tcx files).

For 2:

In the "wrench" menu, go to "Map Display" and set "Course Points" to "On" (this is on by default for tcx files).

==================================

With calculated routes, I usually get a chirp at about 0.1 miles (sometimes, it's shorter) before the turn, two chirps at, and a chirp after. And the screen changes. If the turns are quick, you might not get all the notifications. The distance to the turn is displayed on the map (you might need to set the map to have data fields for that), which is how I know when the notification occurs.

If you are using "course points" (the little blue arrows in white squares), these normally show up at the turns in the track. I haven't figured out the sensitivity of them but they can show up after the real-world turn (not very useful).

Ridewithpgs will locate the course points before the turn (it's a subscription feature). Bikeroutetoaster gives you the option of making a copy of each of them earlier in the route.

Calculated turn-by-turn and course points can be used at the same time.

I know. I've seen him give useful information on other topics. I just thought it was common sense though that when you begin a ride, you press start. I guess I assumed that it was implied, seeing that I made mention about seeing stats once I hooked it up to Garmin Connect, that start had been pushed.

But anyway, you're right. More information in my OP probably would have been a good thing and would have helped to avoid any confusion. Next time I start a thread, I'll make sure to include as much info as possible.

Everyone have a great and blessed day!!

Of course, you have to define the route but the annoying thing is that you have to go IN to the settings for that route ON your garmin and turn on turn notification. Then you get the nice big turn arrows. i've had trouble in the past, if you get off course, sometimes those go away and you just get the little turn arrows that tell you "hey, you just missed your turn."

I use "distance to next" to help mitigate that.

Whenever I create a route on RWGPS I go in and edit each and every turn. I mostly delete all the stupid "slight right to stay on X" turns, and "continue on" stuff. I don't have a subscription, but the turns show up just fine on my 800.

I've tried bikeroutetoaster a few times and I just don't like it... it's much harder to use than RWGPS, although you apparently get a few more features.

It is possible that he's missing the "Turn Guidance On" course setting.

Do you move the cue-sheet entries?

Ridewithgps puts the cue-sheet items at the turns (by default). The cue-sheet entries become "course points" in the Garmin. (You probably know that but I want other people to be able to follow this discussion.)


The Garmins dispay the "course points" on the map (with "Map->Display Course Points" set in the course options).

They also display the course point in a pop-up when you arrive within some short distance (something like 10-20 feet) of the course-point coordinates. I have a course (created on ridewithgps) where the pop-up shows up reliably after you make the turn!

The problem with the course points (in the default setting) is that they are a bit too "delicate".

You really need a reliable annoucement before the turn.

Moving the course-points earlier in the track does that.

Copying the course-point earlier in the track might be even better.

The announcements of the calculated turn-by-turn start around 0.1 mile - 500 ft before the turn. You also get an annoucement at the turn and a confirmation after the turn.

There's also a "Crs. Pt. Dist." data field. "distance to next" displays the distance to the next calculated turn or the distance to the next course point (when "Turn Guidance Off" is set).

When did you last use it? It seems they might have updated it recently. I use ridewithgps but looked at bikeroutetoaster to see what it did. It's approach of copying the course points is interesting.

I do not move the cue sheet entries... so the turn cues are smack AT the turn on the RWGPS site. I think you get more options if you have a paid subscription but the free version works fine for me for the amount I use it.

When I actually go to ride the course, I edit the course and select "Turn guidance: ON" and when i get within some preset distance of the turn, the display pops over to the map and gives me a nice big overlay indicating which way I need to turn. If I don't set the turn guidance to ON, I just get that tiny little indicator that pops up right at the turn, usually as you're going by.

One of the data fields on my front page is always "distance to next" whenever I'm using the navigation, and that helps a great deal, especially if i trim out all the fluff turns (i.e. the "slight right to stay on Colima" when the road gets divided... etc)

Edit: This is a visual of the turn notification I'm getting

They are "smack at" the turns on the map you use on ridewithgps. If the map on the device is different, they may not be quite on the turn.

The calculated route ("Turn Guidance On") uses the map (which has to be routable) on the device to generate when turns are annouced.

Course points are (typically) positioned using a map but, on the device, the map is completely irrelevant to displaying them (you don't need a map for the course points to be displayed).

Note that I'm not doubting that it works fine for you. I'm just pointing out the limitations inherent in how they work.

People with the Garmin 500/510 only have the option of using course points. Being able to move them earlier in the track makes them much more useful for navigating with those units.

There's some variation but it's around 0.1 mile - 500 feet before the turn. (If the turn is quick, it can't be that far.)

That's a "course point" and this is exactly the problem with them I'm talking about.

The "fluff" you are removing only effects "course points". It doesn't effect the annoucements from the calcuated routing ("Turn Guidance On").

Course points display a icon (the blue arrow, for example) and 10 characters of text (you won't see "slight right to stay on Colima" at all on a course point). Ridewithgps uses the cue-sheet "type" field to select the icon and removes standard text like "right", "left" from the name field (ideally, removing all of the standard text just leaves the street name to be displayed as the 10-char course point label).

This is the result of using "Turn Guidance On". It has nothing at all to do with the "course points" (or the "cue sheet" entries in ridewithgps).

Well, there you go. You just unearthed a foggy memory - I started with just some open source maps and got wonky results, now I have the actual garmin maps and it seems to work better with routing.

There are "bicycle" versions of the OSM (openstreet map) Garmin maps. I don't know if you were using those.

The "bicycle" versions don't work very well in the US. The normal OSM versions work pretty well in the US.

There are many sources for the OSM maps for use on the Garmins (which means there could be differences in behavior depending on where you get the file).

This is an easy-to-use source for OSM maps.

Free worldwide Garmin maps from OpenStreetMap

The Garmin City Navigator (CN) maps work well. If you use a different map to plan your route, you can still get odd routing differences but those tend to be small.