Trainer Calibration

I was thinking that very thing, I have been calibrating every workout on my kickr at 7 to 10min in. I always want to mention that I wasn’t wussing out!

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Question, when I look at devices, I see direto on ant + and DI on Bluetooth. Since I can’t use ant + is the DI the right one to select to do spin down within the app? Thanks

To clarify, the device shows up with the name “DI” in your Devices tab? Would you mind sending a screenshot so that I can see what is going on?

And just to lett you know, you are more than welcome to pair using ANT+, you will just need to calibrate separately in the Elite app if you choose to do so :+1:.

Bryce,
Thanks. I’m sure this is the Direto now. I disassociated the pairing and then re-paired at which point the TR app brought up “Elite Direto”. The thing I need to do I guess is the 12.1 divisor for the wheel circumference to get the speed to read correctly.
So here’s the problem, Elite no longer support Wahoo key and iOS on ipad so you can’t spindown calibrate in their app with the ANT+ connection & when I tried to use the bluetooth connection in the Elite app it woudl not read the signal. I figured out that is because BT was connected through TR app.
There’s a bigger issue you guys need to be aware of; there seems to be a problem with ANT+ and iOS on iPAD (which is what I have unfortunately) with certain apps.
Anyway, I’m back in business and calibrated through the elite app, but to confirm, that will only work with bluetooth.
Thank you for the reaching out!

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I just changed from a Tacx to a Direto and mine shows up as DI, anyway i did my first ride last night.
I calibrated mine in the trainer road desktop app (which only asks to spin up to 17km/h… which was very strange). I had 2 big issues.

  • If i paused the workout, it would jam full resistance on resume. I basically had to disconnect the trainer and reconnect to resume. (i gave up 57 mins into the work out as i had to pause and couldn’t start again)

  • Hunting around to meet power target, in erg mode it felt as if i was chasing power, even though my cadence was smooth, it would jam the brakes on then let go and kept doing that.

I had to switch between the big ring and small ring, as i think i was hitting the wattage floor on the recovery drills?

Im hoping calibrating on the Elite App gets rid of all these issues!

Yes, there are gearing and floor issues with the Direto:

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I use a Kickr and always do a spin down after the warm up. I’ve never had a problem continuing the workout.

The only problem I could see with doing a spin down at the end of your workout, ready for the next, would be if the ambient air temp changed. Air temp can have an impact on calibration.

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thanks @mcneese.chad

@mikethg i calibrated after 10 minutes into the work out, so i thought it should have been bang on, after it locked up from the 1st pause i calibrated again but that didn’t help. It was still stuck on max resistance.
It only came right when i disconnected and reconnected the trainer.

There was one instance when i went into a recovery set and coasted for a bit (as in 0 rpm) and then it banged on max resistance! so i had to drop the trainer and re connect again. Very confusing.

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I’ve zoomed into a set so you can see how much “yo-yoing” the power did, despite how consistent my cadence was.

This isn’t an issue with the Direto.

https://www.elite-it.com/en/innovations/Optical-Torque-Sensor

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FWIW I always use the Elite app to calibrate.

How are you connecting TR? I think it shows as DI if you are connecting via ANT+ and Elite Direto via Bluetooth if I’m remembering correctly.

Have you got anything else open at the same time that might think it’s connected to the Trainer? It doesn’t look like the erg mode is connecting properly from your graph.

This is what I have done and stuck to, and my Direto runs mint.

  1. Only use the elite app to calibrate.
  2. Set the smoothing to 6 in the elite app, save and exit.
  3. Open TrainerRoad, set smoothing to 0.
  4. If using Zwift as well, set smoothing to 0.
    All the settings get saved in the Direto.

PS. Wheel size for zwift is set to 2070 in Elite app. If anybody thinks this needs to be a different no., I’ll be keen to hear why etc, cos I’m not sure if 2070 is accurate.

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@cpooleNZ a fellow New Zealander?

I might have to try that again tomorrow. I ended up dropping all my sensors, no power match, calibrated in the Elite App. still same result. Its a bit better but i still died from a work out that i usually smash on my Flux. The constant on and off braking in ERG mode destroyed me.
The screen shot is of a 267 watt interval but yo-yoing from 250-300 watt at a constant 100rpm

@JulianM i used bluetooth, will try ant+ tomorrow
@cpooleNZ any chance you could upload a zoomed in 5-6 min interval 07%20pm

You haven’t got the Elite app open at the same time as the TR app by any chance?

I’ve no idea what the settings are in the Elite app as I only use it to calibrate and have TR smoothing set to 5 seconds and have no issues with fluctuating erg mode. I use the iOS app via bluetooth most of the time.

Yesterdays ride

and zoomed in

It looks like there is an issue somewhere in the communication between the app and trainer. It could be a hardware thing but that’s more unlikely I guess.

Damn yours looks perfect, Na i closed my elite app and turned off bluetooth on my phone, only using the trainer and hrm on my macbook. Im stumped.
I too have smoothening set to 5 on TR but also noticed smoothening is set to the default 2 on the Elite app.
Im going to try what @cpooleNZ mentioned. If no luck i’m taking the trainer back i guess.

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**UPDATE

So i changed the smoothening on the Elite App to 6 and was still jumping up and down applying the brake on and off… killing my legs… See Below


I then changed it to 10 and got a near dead flat perfect reading

However it still felt like the brake was kicking on and off although my legs were pretty cooked. Im hoping tomorrow after a rest i’ll be able to actually complete a work out but its definitely near damn impossible to get that feeling off peddling over the gear like i did on my tacx flux, this feels like i’m constantly trying to push against the ERG brake.

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I read some of the responses but not all of them so this could be a repeat. I have a wheel off trainer and do a spin down every workout. Just about every workout has a warm up section that peaks then before the actual work begins there is drop in intensity. That is where I do my spin down every workout. Soon as that is done I calibrate my power meter. Then back into the workout.

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@stefanjoseph, you might also want to check out this topic Elite Drivo revisited (GPLama), where there’s a bit more discussion about elite drivo’s wandering behaviour.

my take on this: 1) we are not machines so will not put out constant power, 2) the drivo is a slave to its own accuracy - if elite allowed for slightly more wiggle room in their power adjustment algorithms.

I don’t really experience seesawing in longish ftp intervals. For short sprints, I’ve taught myself to not apply the requested power until I really feel the resistance kick in, which is usually 1-2 seconds after the start of an interval

Increasing the power smoothing is a great way to trick your brain into avoiding compensating for on-screen fluctuating power numbers.

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The brake does kick on and off - it has to in order to keep target power as the rider power output/cadence fluctuate.

I notice that if I try chase a power target on my Direto, I can get the power to fluctuate like in some of your pics. Or if I’m tired, and my cadence starts to fluctuate, the power will be more variable. But generally my Direto has lower variability similar to @JulianM. See below.

For your next ride, cover up the power profile, and focus on pedaling with a smooth steady cadence - any difference?

A couple of other Qs:

  • What are you using for cadence? I use the Direto as the source.
  • what gear are you riding in? I find my Direto reacts quicker if I ride in an easier gear - little ring, mid cassette.

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@DaveWh I’m using the inbuilt direto cadence as the source.

So i think i’ve got the trainer to a useable state, i can still feel the trainer adjusting (thanks @maamen for the GPlama explanation). It’s a lot more fatiguing than the taxc on the legs, so much so ive had to lower my ftp by 10 watt. Anyway heres a pic of todays workout.

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