I think the H10 is hands down the best HR strap you can buy in terms of industrial design, fit and finish. As long as you’re still using the original, factory installed battery, life is awesome.
I had an entire episode with my first H10. After replacing the original factory battery, I had all sorts of water intrusion issues. New batteries would only last about 4 weeks, etc. I got Polar to replace my original H10 under the warranty.
I did a ton of research on the topic, and the best answer I came across is that there are some shortcomings of the H10 battery cover design (more of a push/snap – apologies in advance mechanical engineer friends) versus a more conventional screw-on (I believe cam action is the term?) battery cover.
The battery cover design is the Achilles heel of the H10. Once you come to terms with that, life gets much better.
I bet nobody ever thought to grease the gasket in there. I see the same thing with Stages. The gasket in there comes from Stages bone dry and Stages have notoriously had water intrusion issues. A little silicone grease probably increases the water resistance ten fold.
The fact the user even needs to worry about things like greasing the o-ring or making sure it doesn’t get stretched out is tremendously silly. I hope Polar is working to re-engineer it.
I think I found out something interesting tonight. I always disconnect my H10 but I got the low battery notification on my garmin despite it being disconnected. Flip it stud side up and the garmin loses the sensor so hopefully its off.
Tried he vaselin and it did not work. During the first 35min, it did not go over 90bpm, which is not possible. I hate that. I’d rather have no data than wrong data.
And HRV4training told me this morning (and the day before) that the signal was not good (HRV was the main reason I bought the H10). Before that is was always excellent.
I had a cheap HRM before that lasted for years, until the strap was completely destroyed. That’s not some new technology, I don’t understand why it is not working as expected.
70€ and less than one year.
I’m done with it.
Going back to Garmin, I think they also have good HRV recording.
And for google’s search engine (hopefully that can help other people make up their mind) :
“polar h10 review after a few months : not a reliable HRM, data is partially inaccurate”
Ironically, after giving the advice to use vaseline, my own H10 started playing up. I have 2 sensors and they were both playing up the same way. So I swapped in my wife’s strap using my sensor and it is working fine again.
Therefore, I believe the vaseline trick absolutely works if you sweat profusely but ultimately, the strap will give up and need replacing. The drop outs look different between sweat related ones (very sharp drops to nothing, then quick recovery) vs strap worn out (random drops down and then slower recovery)
