Anyone else got a prediction on lifespan on one of these straps?
It gets a good rinse in the shower but it doesn’t seem to live very long.
Is it just me being unlucky?
Which model? My HRM Pro-Plus seems to have lasted about two and a half years (it’s not dead-dead, but it’s showing erratic, nonsensical values, and different ones on Bluetooth and ANT+)
I have one of the original Garmin HR straps that I got in 2010. It’s still working fine, thought I had to dry it out once after it got wonky. I opened the cover, removed the battery, and left it in a warm spot for a while. This is the pre-Deluxe version that’s like a 10" length of flexible plastic instead of the newer types that have the center module that snaps on and off the strap.
I went through a couple garmin HRM and switched to polar. Knock on wood, it’s been going 3 years now, no issues.
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Seems to be dependent on the user. I get a couple years out of mine if I use it daily. Long enough I don’t feel bad about it wearing out.
My current one is probably 4 years now, but I started using my wrist HR for my commute and such so I wear it less.
I’ve never had one wear out. The three things I usually have to do are either:
1: replace battery
2: wash the strap in soapy water
3: if on really long ride, my have to re-wet the electrode spots so it gets a better connection
I used to buy those less expensive hard plastic Garmin straps and they would last forever. I think you can still buy it.
Last time I bought a Polar for the two channel bluetooth, and the strap lasted 5 years.
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I’ve had two of an older model both die after 1-2 years. With the first one, I washed just the strap with my cycling clothes each week. With the second one, I rinsed with water in the shower after the rep recommended not washing the strap.
When I called Garmin about the last death, they gave me a discount on the HRM 200, which they said should last much longer. We’ll see.
Just get a replacement strap off eBay for next to nothing, often the units themselves are fine.
Im going off memory so I could be slightly wrong.
- I had my original garmin Hard Strap for about 9years before it died. It gave me a few spikes (or at least what I thought were spikes but knowing better about HR now maybe they weren’t)
- I bought a cheap BBB soft strap that did ant+ and bluetooth, but you only get what you pay for or maybe it was the machine washing every week, it lasted only 6 months
- I gave them a 2nd chance and got a year + out of it with wiping down and a change of strap.
- CooSpo had appeared on the scene by then and although they were cheaper still I got one of their units and it lasted about 2+ years (circa 3 straps).
- I thought I’d try better quality the next time and gave in to the TicKR hype. The first unit died after a few weeks the pods were rusted but after a bit of cleaning I brought it back to life and got a year out of it before it failed the same way. No cleaning brought it back to life this time. Tbf to Wahoo they sent me a replacement under warranty.
- But being impatient I ordered a Polar H10, for next day delivery though. Touchwood the first strap on it lasted nearly 2 years before it started to give me drop outs. I’m now on my 2nd strap which I’ve had for about a year and the both it and the orighal H10 unit are still good
Same here. Two Garmin straps died on me within two years (actually, I died on a descent, according to Garmin, when my 520 showed HR=0).
I switched to Polar and it’s been flawless for over a year so far.
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I switched to Polar too - mostly because I wanted to play around with estimating VT1 with dfa alpha1 hrv measurements. (The Polar H10 has dual bluetooth channels so you can connect it to multiple devices / software at the same time.)
I got 5 years out of my Polar strap before it gave up. I just wipe it down most of the time and give it a rinse like once a month.