Garmin Edge Battery life

lesdon499

I bought a Garmin Edge 305 a year ago. The computer is brilliant, however I am about to do Lands End to John O'Groats and dont think that the battery will last all day. Is there a battery extender for this or a way of extending it? I will have a support vehicle so can use a12v cable but will that allow me to connect whilst the unit is on, say at a break?

cheers

willbevan

i have had my 305 (forerunner mind you not the edge as i used to do more running) used it for about 8 hrs today without a problem, battery indicator was still about half, think they are supposed to be good for 14 odd hours arnt they? (i realise this might be marketing hype, and when the unit is new)

Now i have seen on ebay but cant see any at the moment, battery extenders, i.e plugs into the usb port and supplies power while its on and working... so that would be an option, never used one mind you as my foreunner has a cradle rather than a mini usb on it (would need to take the cradle round lol|)

blorg

In my experience you will get at least 8-10 hours out of it. I made it around a 200km sportive without issue- one tip might be to turn it off if you are stopping for any length of time; when you turn it back on it will continue your ride where you left off (make sure to remember to press "start" again.)

It is USB power which is a benefit as it does give you a fair amount of flexibility with the charging and you would be able to use a cigarette lighter support vehicle no problem. It does work fine while charging. I would imagine (although haven't done it) that you could use something like this while on the move (search Ebay for many more options.) It just needs mini-USB as the output.

Are you planning an all-out day and night continuous attempt or a "cycle 8-10 hours a day" attempt? Because if the latter the Edge will be fine as it is and you can just recharge overnight.

An important thing to bear in mind (if this is something you want to do) is that it won't have room to record your whole ride and will start dropping the earlier days off as you progress. I discovered this on the Camino de Santiago to my cost- only had the last 200 km or so. So if you want it all recorded I would suggest a laptop in the support vehicle!

paulbricey

I rode LeJoG with a Garmnin 305. I used a battery boost and didn't need to switch off the Garmnin for the whole 8 days trip (which resulted in data overload since I never switched the Garmin off and I only actually got to see the total miles & last 250 miles in detail). REMEMBER TO STOP IT EVERY NIGHT !!!!

Anyway....Battery adapter cost £4.99 and uses 4 AA batteries which you change every 3 days. I just plugged the boost into the Garmin and stuck them both in a small bar bag. With boost the charge hardly falls at all during 24 hours period and I only used 8 AA batteries overall - at night I switched Garmin to mains USB charge.

GeorgeShaw

I think 8-10 hours is the guide time for the battery. I did 9hrs 30 the other weekend without any problems. But I've just bought one of these:

http://www.portablepowersupplies.co.uk/ ... rypack.htm

... which I hope will do the trick, although I haven't tested it yet, because I can't get my USB cable into the Garmin becuse the stem is in the way. Does anybody know where to get USB cables with a right-angle plug in the UK?

blorg

I was on a randonee yesterday which answers the question. 10h30m! It fell just short of getting the whole thing; I think it would have managed it if I had turned it off at stops or not recorded my cycle to the start.

blorg

paulbricey wrote:

I rode LeJoG with a Garmnin 305. I used a battery boost and didn't need to switch off the Garmnin for the whole 8 days trip (which resulted in data overload since I never switched the Garmin off and I only actually got to see the total miles & last 250 miles in detail). REMEMBER TO STOP IT EVERY NIGHT !!!!

It wouldn't matter if you stopped it every night, you would still only get the last ~250 miles (amount depending on data recorded and route complexity.) Only way around this is to download before it runs out of room- another trick though is that you can save your routes as courses (as the Garmin memory is segregated between routes and courses) effectively doubling the data recordable. You will still run out of room on a LeJoG though. It MAY be possible that the 605/705 get around this limitation as they take SD cards.

Cunobelin

Yet another problem with the EDGE!!!!!!

When I tour I use a Dell PDA and Memory-Map Navigator to download the track for the day, review and upload the following day and hence keep an accurate record.

Unfortunately as the Edge uses different files (tcx and CRS) I can't do this with the Edge. I tiur with the ETrex or ForeTrex as they are much more compatible.

How are you recording?

I use "Smart recording" as this takes up less memory than the 1 second recording option. This will extend the recording capacity.

paulbricey

Blorg, how does that work.....? I'm first to admit I haven't investigated the data capacity side but.....

At start of 8 days LeJog I switch on 305 and connect battery support.....it isn't configured for auto-off....and after 8 days I switch it off. So every night (say 12 hours per day) I presume I'm still collecting data points.....whereas if I switched it off at the end of each ride & back on each morming surely I 'save' a night worth of data logging (and there was some weird barometric stuff happening overnight - one morning I woke up at -90M below sea level when I was clearly +100M above ! when night before I was spot on).

Historically I've stored loads of data on the Garmin based on daily switch on/switch off approach (with download but not data history clear) and I'm sure I've stored way over 250 miles total..... never read that single trip memory is constrained more than multi lap/trip (but there isn't much info in the manual anyway)

blorg

Cunobelin wrote:

I use "Smart recording" as this takes up less memory than the 1 second recording option. This will extend the recording capacity.

This is certainly true, it majorly extends, but from a hard limit of 3.5 hours to an arbirary limit based on number of trackpoints the route needs. To give you an idea of the limit, my own Garmin currently breaks off at 367km, which is under a week ago. You still have to download regularly!

veryslowtwitch

Hello

My 305 internal battery lasts about 8 hours.

For a big (12 hour) ride I used a 9v battery and a home-made voltage regulator (to 5v) to give a few extra hours. I couldn't find a commercial alternative. I plugged this in after about 7 hours and taped the battery to the bars.

I've lost the link with instructions but should be easy to find on google. Cost about £2 to make from Maplins. (I have no electronic background)

If you can charge it properly each night then this combo would be perfect.

regards

Alan[/i]

blorg

paulbricey wrote:

At start of 8 days LeJog I switch on 305 and connect battery support.....it isn't configured for auto-off....and after 8 days I switch it off. So every night (say 12 hours per day) I presume I'm still collecting data points.....whereas if I switched it off at the end of each ride & back on each morming surely I 'save' a night worth of data logging

Yes, this is true, you will save a bit doing this, but not that much (you will basically just save on it recording GPS drift, which should be less intense than an actual cycle anyway.)

Historically I've stored loads of data on the Garmin based on daily switch on/switch off approach (with download but not data history clear) and I'm sure I've stored way over 250 miles total..... never read that single trip memory is constrained more than multi lap/trip (but there isn't much info in the manual anyway)

Yes you are right, you never need to clear anything off the device, it just overwrites the old stuff. But for the sruff it deletes it does keep the lap summaries, just no GPS points or graphs. So if you download after you have been on the road for over ~375km you will only get total distance etc. for anything you recorded before that, with no map. You can verify this by going into an old route and "view map" on the device itself, or by doing an import into a new copy of Training Center- it will copy all the totals data across but you will get "there is no graph for the xxx item" if you go to look in detail. I presumed it was saving based on not deleting and looking at the history on the device before I did the Camino, and was a bit miffed after that I didn't have any elevation or GPS data.