My Garmin switched itself off mid ride. Any ideas why?

[Blue Hills]

My 3 Etrex20s/20xs (have stocked up as I don't think there is anything better) do this now and again.

I think it's due to either of the two possibilities mentioned upthread - maybe both.

1: Temporary loss of power from battery bounce.
2: Confusion caused by satellite loss when it is navigating a route.

Sometimes it even freezes.

It's not a great problem if that happens.

And it is not common.

I just stop awhile (and can snack to avoid bonk issues) and briefly unconnect a battery and reboot.

Compared to the problems I have read about on other units, often far far more expensive, it's nothing to worry about.

All the Etrex 20 needs is a faster processor and a slightly bigger screen.

But instead of doing that, Garmin may well discontinue it for folks who need the latest thing.

I'll wave them off into the distance.

 

[cyberknight]

TBH my 200 apart from shortened battery life never missed a beat and still use it to commute,left it on the bike at work accidentally and no one's nicked it

 

[Sharky]

My 200 occasionally goes into auto pause on one of our local hills. Must be going so slowly, it thinks I've stopped.

 

[Milzy]

Because it’s not a Wahoo device.

 

[ColinJ]

Edge 200 battery is a clip afaik it's the sound that's hard wired,mate put a new battery in mine and didn't rewire the sound as it was too fiddly and now the battery rattles but it hasn't disconnected

You are right. I just found a video on YouTube showing how to do it. The little speaker only needs a couple of wires connecting - not difficult when you have the thing in pieces anyway. Mind you, I was building and repairing electronic devices for nearly 20 years so it would be easy compared to many of the things I tackled.

I suppose it would be possible that the battery connector hadn't quite been pushed on properly and became intermittent.

 

[cyberknight]

You are right. I just found a video on YouTube showing how to do it. The little speaker only needs a couple of wires connecting - not difficult when you have the thing in pieces anyway. Mind you, I was building and repairing electronic devices for nearly 20 years so it would be easy compared to many of the things I tackled.

I suppose it would be possible that the battery connector hadn't quite been pushed on properly and became intermittent.

Im going to order a new battery for my 800 with tools so i might have a look at the 200 myself, i do need to sell a few as i now have 4 !

 

[I like Skol]

My Garmin Edge Touring switches off occasionally and I have a theory.

It has happened twice near Manchester airport and at other places, where with hindsight I think I may have been riding past mobile phone masts or similar equipment. My theory is that there is either an anti-terrorism jamming signal in use near certain key military and civilian installations to help prevent accurate attack, or these type of sites emit a signal of some sort that at close quarters is so intense that it overpowers the Garmin's circuitry and causes it to shut down to prevent damage. Mountain biking and bumpy cobbled roads have never caused a shut-down so I don't buy the poor battery connection idea.

EDIT: I also think the reason the shutdown doesn't happen everytime at the same location is because the use of a jamming signal is linked to intelligence information about periods of heightened risk!!! I'll get my foil hat......

 

[Pale Rider]

My Edge Touring acts up in various intermittent ways.

It once decided I was in Austria, despite actually being in a County Durham pit village.

Its latest trick is to stop working with the laptop - I wonder if it doesn't really like Macs.

Overall, it's next to useless, but I'm not convinced the handful of competitors would be any better.

 

[Blue Hills]

My Garmin Edge Touring switches off occasionally and I have a theory.

It has happened twice near Manchester airport and at other places, where with hindsight I think I may have been riding past mobile phone masts or similar equipment. My theory is that there is either an anti-terrorism jamming signal in use near certain key military and civilian installations to help prevent accurate attack, or these type of sites emit a signal of some sort that at close quarters is so intense that it overpowers the Garmin's circuitry and causes it to shut down to prevent damage. Mountain biking and bumpy cobbled roads have never caused a shut-down so I don't buy the poor battery connection idea.

EDIT: I also think the reason the shutdown doesn't happen everytime at the same location is because the use of a jamming signal is linked to intelligence information about periods of heightened risk!!! I'll get my foil hat......

Have come across such theories before.
Does it commonly switch off in any other places?
Suppose you could set up a web site where folk could log such things and see if a pattern emerged.
But you might get a visit.

 

[Blue Hills]

My Edge Touring acts up in various intermittent ways.

It once decided I was in Austria, despite actually being in a County Durham pit village.

Its latest trick is to stop working with the laptop - I wonder if it doesn't really like Macs.

Overall, it's next to useless, but I'm not convinced the handful of competitors would be any better.

Keep it simple pale rider, get an etrex20/x
You no more need a gps with a "touring" brand sold at a premium than you need rapha touring shorts.

 

[iateyoubutler]

I`ve got an edge 500, on the whole it`s been a good workhorse, but not without it`s bugs. Even from new it`s taken a good 15 mins to get a satellite signal - that I can live with. On a good number of occasions it just comes up "working" and stays like that for an hour or so, refusing to do anything else, and on a handful of rides it`s got it knickers in a twist mid ride, then when I`ve uploaded the route afterwards it thinks I`ve been at the other end of the country - with an average speed of 600-700mph

 

[SkipdiverJohn]

Garmin just appear to produce cranky electronics with mediocre on the fly navigation. I was using a Garmin car sat nav the other day that suddenly stopped following the route I was taking and told me I was doing 52 mph and was 18 miles away from my destination, for about five minutes regardless of my actual speed. Then it suddenly started working properly again as suddenly as it had stopped. This was on a clear day with no tree cover so there should have been no issues with satellite availability. I also find it slow to re-route on the move if you ignore the planned route it wants you to use - which often isn't the quickest or most logical one either. Compared to say, TomToms, they are definitely inferior, and I would not buy any of their stuff for cycling navigation!

 

[ColinJ]

They are infuriatingly inconsistent with their products! I have been using a very early Garmin Etrex for 13 years and it has been extremely reliable, except for 2 things - (1) The bouncing battery problem. Once I did my Blu Tack bodge, that problem went away. (2) One which has caught me out a couple of times - switching the device on indoors. It isn't sensitive enough to pick up the satellite signals and gets confused. After that it can take tens of minutes to come to life. The answer to that is for me to wait until I leave the house before switching the device on. Once it has locked onto the satellites, it is fine.

My Edge 500, however, is almost entirely useless for navigation. I have tried everything - every version of firmware available; more waypoints per route; fewer waypoints per route; spreading waypoints equally through routes; breaking up routes into shorter segments. I could probably just about use it if I loaded a separate, carefully tweaked file for every hour of riding. Blow that!

 

[Dogtrousers]

Last year, on two Friday Night Rides, my Garmin Oregon switched itself off on Cornwall road at about 00:10. Same time, same place

The Oregon isn't one of those flakey bike specific units. It's a rock solid outdoor device and the only times, apart from this, that it has turned off have been big pothole shocks.

Same time ... Same place ... Cue twilight zone music.

Boringly it hasn't done it since, despite riding down the same road at the same time several times.

 

[Heltor Chasca]

Several riders on an Audax I was on experienced their Garmins switching off by a barracks near Salisbury. A neighbour who was in the forces said this might be normal but was very cagey as to why/how.

My Wahoo was fine.