Does anyone know offhand at what voltage the older non premium HR straps start dropping out at? Replaced the battery in mine a couple of weeks ago and last night on my bike ride I noticed that I had a flat topped HR (ie, perfectly 125 bpm for 2-5 minutes at a time). So I checked the batt’s voltage and it was 3.0 - checked a new battery and it’s 3.19V.
Dunno, but I’m experiencing an issue with my premium HR strap–all HR’s read ~200 to 220. In the past this was a symptom that the battery was going going gone…so I shelled out for a shiny new duracell and…no dice.
Unrelated to your issue, but I’ll tag along in case someone knows how to fix this before I take the thing back to REI for a replacement. To head off the questions, no, I don’t have issues with shirt static or skin conductivity–the thing worked normally until it didn’t. My transmitter in other straps doesn’t work, other transmitters in my strap do work, so I think the transmitter has gone bad…
Zack I quit using the premium heart strap for that very reason. Apparently the Garmin HR straps are known for this, the fix is to get a Polar one, but i have no idea which one. If I did, I’d grab one of those instead of using this old one, it kind of beats up on me.
In the old Garmin HRM the battery should work down to about 2.4 volts. If you get sweat inside the electronics part because the case cracks or you lose the battery door O-ring, then that pretty much kills it. You might also check the battery contacts inside the opening - they can get stuck and give you bad behavior.
For the softstrap HRM, Garmin has released several updated straps with better electrodes. You can also buy the Polar replacement soft strap (just the electrode part, not the transmitter module) at various brick and mortar shops as well as online. The electrode snap spacing is common to almost all of the current crop of soft strap transmitters so you can mix and match a fair bit, as long as the transmitter is ANT+ compatible (which excludes Polar’s modules).
I’ve been using a Polar and Garmin strap for a couple of years now. I had issues
where the HR would either peg or drop out entirely UNTIL(!) I started using a gel;specifically Spectra 360 Electrode Gel
I’ve had no issues with the Garmin premium or Polar strap. I don’t know which Polar strap it is, came with my watch I never wear any longer