Cycliq fly6 vs Garmin Varia

As others have mentioned, the perfect solution doesn’t exist yet: a varia that records video like the fly6. One day…

You’d think that this wouldn’t really be a significant leap for Garmin, they have the Varia and VIRB technology. I’d be front of the queue, I swear by my Varia and now we have a trailer for our son it has come in very useful (added a Garmin mount to the rear frame of the trailer). I get that it doesn’t stop you actually being hit but it gives me vital information that may allow me time to assess the situation and cycle into the ditch or hedge if necessary. If the Varia could record that too… I’d be pulling the bike out of the ditch and cycling to the police station.

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I had the Fly6 and Fly12, the Fly6 stopped working after about 6 months and then it took another 3 months with their customer service just to get an RMA and by then I had bought the Varia and just chucked the Fly6. The Fly12 fell off its mount about a month ago while riding and I never found it. The quality of the video isn’t that great on the Cycliq but not bad for the price. I plan on just buying GoPro’s for the future though and spend the extra money for much higher quality. The Cycliq app almost never worked for me, sometimes it would, sometimes it wouldn’t but I never had any idea when it would or wouldn’t. A lot of times I couldn’t tell if they were recording or not because they would randomly turn off even with the settings off for idle timeout and stuff which was one of my main issues, I would stop and look and my light would be off and I would go back and look at the footage and 15 minutes into my ride it just randomly turned off for some reason. Overall not a fan of Cycliq as products and their customer support is absolutely horrendous, like 3-5 days per response and 50 hoops to jump through to get to the next step.

Now I have the Garmin Varia RTL515 on back and a Garmin Varia headlight also, I’m a big fan of having the radar, it does make me feel more confident riding on the more narrow roads around here knowing when a car is coming and how many. I would like to have a camera again because I do worry about that time that eventually something happens but I’ll invest in either a GoPro or maybe a less expensive version that can record at least a couple hours.

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Sadly, no there’s no explicit distance recorded. Here’s a shot of what’s shown on the Garmin Connect web page. The Connect phone app shows the same thing. Zooming in will show the speed the whole time the car was behind you.

image

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Would never ride on rural roads without my Varia. I don’t want a video of getting hit, I want to know a car is coming

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Thanks! Yes I suppose it doesn’t know how close they passed, because the cars move out of the radar’s view before they are next to you. You’d need two, one back, one front, then you could work out where they were in between. Just thought it’d be interesting to see how close cars really pass.

To be honest, I’m not sure if knowing that a car is coming would help me. There is usually nowhere to escape to where I ride, at least not without crashing (like riding straight into a dry stone wall) And on the other hand, in 95% of cases, I hear the car behind me anyway. I suppose it is different if you’re on a fast road with a hard shoulder, where you could ride if it wasn’t so full of gravel/bad tarmac etc.

Thoughts on the Ghost X? Looks fairly sleek, and the 5 hr battery life with dash cam mode sounds good.

How do you attach the Varia and Fly6 together?

It will. When you know a car is coming, the best thing you can do is stay consistent. This helps the driver pass you safely. It helps you know when you need to hug the edge of the road for 10sec and keep a straight line. It also allows you to know when you can take more of the road because of no cars.

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I’m using the Fly12 (happy with it, preordered the new Fly6 and I’m getting antsy for a ship date), as well as the RVR315 (the newer Varia without lights). I think the combination of both is the way to go, IMO - the Varia helps for early warning, but there’s only so much I can control and if I get hit (which has happened before), I want as much documentation as possible. I’d also recommend looking at Shapeways for some better mounting options - once my Fly6 comes I’ve got a mount that’ll clip into the ICS thing on my Fizik saddle and the Varia/Fly6 will be neatly side by side.

Depends on the bike, but on my road bike, the Varia goes on the seatpost and I’ve rigged the weird velcro strap of the Fly6 around the seat stays. A bike with more seatpost could probably stack them.

At the big picture level I think (hope!) they will. In UK I know several people who have submitted camera footage to police which has enabled successful prosecutions. More cyclists carrying cameras + more police prosecutions of drivers based on camera footage should make the roads safer for all of us as it will make at least some drivers think twice before making a close pass or running a cyclist off the road.

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As you probably know, but for others, they do Speed awareness courses in the UK, case of doing the course, paying for it yourself, instead of receiving a fine and points for speeding.

Have I have also been informed that car/motorbike drivers in the UK now have the option to pay to attend a “cycling awareness courses” instead of prosecution, if camera footage shows they have been a danger to cyclists.

IMO its a better solution than a fine and points, that could make them more resentful of cyclists. Some informed education is always a good thing.

That’s nice selective quoting there. :roll_eyes:

How so? Please explain to me how any part of your entire post is any different than the part I quoted. I could quote your entire post and it would have the same meaning. :man_shrugging:

You are saying you don’t think it would be helpful. I understand. What I am saying is you don’t think it would be helpful, but once you have it you will realize it’s value.

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Wouldn’t be without my Varia. Knowing a car is coming makes me move back in to the side of the road and be alert as the car passes. rest of the time I can move out of the gutter and enjoy the ride without having to look behind every 10 seconds because I thought I heard a car through the wind noise. With the increasing electric cars, the only noise is the tyres on the road surface, I’m sure it will become even more useful.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t trust it with my life, shoulder checks are part of my motorbiking, a habit you don’t want to lose. But it stops that car sneaking up on you, startling you, or stoppig yourself swerving out because of a road obstacle not aware a car is close…my n=1

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It’s the way you quoted the bit of my post where I say “I don’t know”, deleted the reasoning I gave, and insisted that I would find it useful in a scenario that doesn’t match up with the one I gave.

But hey, I don’t actually want to start an argument about this, if people find the radar useful, by all means use it. :slight_smile:

I don’t want to argue either. We’re just on 2 different pages in regards to quoting. That’s ok.

Something I’ll add in regards to the varia, without quoting, is the info it gives you doesn’t mean you have to dive into a ditch. Often times we make movements side to side on the road that we don’t realize. The notification that a vehicle is behind allows you to focus for a short time and drastically increases safety.

I use Cycliq front and rear camera. The quality is surprising better than expected.

Where I rode, sometimes drivers would make horrible decisions or just intentionally run you out of the road while most of the time drivers are respectful and kind. Having a radar telling me some car is coming is not gonna prevent some idiots trying to kill me.

So far the downside of purchasing the camera is that if I didn’t bring the camera, I beat myself up for not doing so after close calls…

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I have the Varia and use a mirror as well (Trieye). I really recommend the Varia and in combination with the mirror I can see well in advance if a car is giving me enough room

Just one word of caution if you want to use the car stats, it only works with newer head units. My Garmin 520 does not record this type of data although it does show the cars on the heat unit and it beeps when detecting cars.

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