Garmin Edge 705 Review Update
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Updated: April 2009 Usage My Garmin Edge 705 itself has been going great guns, never an issue. Accessories however have been a different story. Hardware Issues GSC10 I managed to kill a 3rd GSC10. I had it setup perfectly on my bike. The cadence magnet and the wheel magnet were a nice distance from the sensors, no chance of giving them even the slightest knock. All was going fine until I hit a stick one day. It was only a small stick and I didn't think anything of it until my Garmin autopaused and then started again. My first thought was that the speed sensor has died again, and sure enough it had. A quick stop and spin of the back wheel showed that the speed sensor had died, just from getting hit (possibly, I don't know if it actually hit the sensor), by a skinny stick. I am not impressed with the reed switches (or whatever is breaking) that Garmin has used. I've got old Cateye speedos which still work even after they have had the wheel magnet hit the sensor ever time I've gotten out of the saddle for years. Candence worked fine until I rode in some heavy rain one day and the unit died all together. Reading the motionbased forums suggests that another design failing of the GSC10 is that it isn't water sealed properly and moisture ends up corroding the electronics. I sent the cadence sensor back and it was received by Garmin Australia on the 29th of Janurary 2009. Today is the 24th April and I have still not received a replacement. Numerous phone calls have resulted in a variety of excuses, namely that there is no stock of cadence sensors available, even from the US. I find this hard to swallow when I can walk into a bike shop and see one sitting the shelf, or buy from a multitude of online stores. I've also been told 3 times that I would have one in the post tomorrow. The last time I was told this was yesterday so I'll see what's waiting when I get home today. Mount In addition to the GSC10 issues, there is the handlebar mount. How many of these have broken around the world in the last 12 months? I know I'm up to nearly 10. I've tried mounting with zip ties tight, loose, thick rubber around the stem, thin rubber, no rubber, but they still break. After the first one broke and I had to wait to 2 months for Garmin Australia to replace the front face of my 705 (more awesome stock levels of Edge components), I've been watchful of these and know when they are about to break.  What causes the mount to break is the fact that where the zip ties pass though the inner mount and clamp onto the stem is made of very thin plastic. All the weight of the 705 and any momentum it generates pass through these 2 thin pieces of plastic. Over time, and not very much, this plastic cracks and allows the inner mount to come free from the handlbar/stem and take the 705 with it. The elegant solution that my clever mate came up with was to bond the inner and outer mount together. This in effect changes the part of the mount that sees the 705 momentum to the much thicker outer mount. In fact the skinny bits of plastic on the inner mount are no longer needed and he has been riding around on one of my broken mounts for a few weeks. The only drawback is that the mount is now stuck in one orientation.  To do this, he has drilled 4 holes (2 on each side near the corners) through the outer shell and into the inner mount. The inner mount is actually quite beefy where the 705 attaches, just not where the zip ties pass though. Into each of these holes he has inserted a 2mm carbon rod which has been glued in place with resin. A bit more resin in between the 2 parts finshes the bonding. Using pins is probably a little over the top but it certainly makes the bonding of the inner and outer sections solid. In the above and below images you can see where one of the drops of resin has been sanded off to expose the carbon rod.  |