Finally bought a Varia 515 for my long gravel rides. WOW, amazing! I can’t believe I waited this long to get one. It is exactly what I needed and is spot on accurate.
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I rode with out mine today as I was on the TT bike, I am going to have to figure out a way to get it on the TT bike too 
The Varia comes with a more aero shaped wedge for the seat mast. Not sure if this suits your post? Or is it that it doesn’t fit with rear bottle cages, etc?
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I think I could use the aero mount in conjunction with a massively bigger couple of bands. It’s not quite square enough though IIRC. 
Just loop another band with the original band…I do that all the time for my TT bike (have yet to mount a Varia on it, though…it is currently semi-retired. 
)
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I got my Varia 515 about a week now and already in love with it. I do most of my riding on suburban streets so I’m not too worried about actually getting run over from behind but I do often ride in the middle of the road to avoid rough payment and it is really nice to get advance warning when there’s somebody behind me and I need to get over, It has the effect of making the available road wider. I feel much more comfortable riding the line I want.
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I use a ziptie and has not moved
I highly recommend the garmin seatpost mount. If you use their rubber band mounts, you might lose your unit when the bands crack and break some day.
I had the Garmin seatpost mount but returned it - it was so wide that my legs touched it while riding.
I use the standard mount now with an extra ziptie and it does not move a bit anymore and there is no chance it can fall of.
I recently purchased the Varia 515 and think it is amazing. This time of the year the shoulders and bike lanes are a little rough with winter salt, stones and other debris. It is great being able to ride in the middle of the road and move over when I get notified of an approaching car.
My seat post isn’t as high as many so I was having problems fitting the saddle bag and radar. I found a good solution utilizing a saddle mount. Thought I would share it for others to see.
This is the one I purchased but I see there are quite a few that look the same on amazon.
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Can you please post a side pic so I can see how the seat bag is mounted? Thanks!
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Does anyone know if it’s possible to customize alerts by activity profile on a 1040? I wasn’t able to find the option.
I live in Central London, and would like do disable beeping while riding in the city.
You can do it with the 1030 so I suspect they won’t have discontinued it in the 1040. Its something like swiping down>lights>radar>settings
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On the 1040 that seems to change the setting for all activity profiles. There are other profiles which I would still want to alert, just not the “busy city streets” one.
Thinking about one of the 515 models to pair with a 1040, could anyone with a Garmin head unit confirm if the head unit can show the battery state?
What do you mean by ‘show the battery state’?
I get a notice on my 1040 if my battery on my 515 is low. I can also check the battery status(a battery symbol with 5 bars iirc) through the sensor screen. I’m not sure if a data field can be added for it though.
That’s good enough! Just wanted to see if I could keep an eye on it while rolling along.
Tvm
It also shows from the lights “swipe down menu” (the battery of the headlight doesn’t though, as it seems to care about the radar unit (which draws from the same battery as the taillight)