Some what Newbe question wind cal later in ride

[SummitCoBiker]

Hi,
I have had my ISport since the end of last year. I did take the winter off of my bike as it is a little hard to ride in the mountains of Colorado. Great place to live though otherwise!

I am not sure if this is a new problem or it has always acted this way but I at least just noticed it. When I wake up my ISport it does the auto cal, and this works just fine you get a bar that slowly goes to the left (I would think this is it calibrating). If you are in the middle of a ride though and decide to go into the menu and do a wind cal it immediately flashes "Wind Done" it seems like it is happening to fast to be actually calibrating the wind port. Is this normal or does it sound like a problem?

Today I was getting very high power readings so the first thing I thought of was the wind cal. After riding for a while though I think it might be my wind offset from the cal ride. Is there a way to see your wind scaling with the ISport? I did do a new cal ride yesterday because I thought my readings were just a bit off at the time. When comparing power readings into the wind and with the wind against the amount of perceived work I was doing. Downhill does tend to be against the wind for me and uphill with it (1.5 to 2% grade) but I was getting much higher wattage going up hill with same hart rate?

Thank you for the help.

[lorduintah]

I hope you were trying to do wind calibrations while stopped - they won't work if you are moving.

We also have had a lot of mentions about perceived effort into/with the wind or up/down hills and what the power meter is displaying.

To make it short, perception and reality do not always align. A meter is reporting how you really are doing work and you should have a little trust in what you see.

If you downshift going up hills - it may seem like it is easier and your rpms may go up - that is how you manage to make it to the top of Vail pass...

Wish I were there.....

Tom

[SummitCoBiker]

I was stopped for the wind cal, Jumped in a group of trees to help shield the wind. So should you always see the bar go across the screen or can it happen so fast that does not get seen?

I do understand your point about the perceived work I was doing but now I am way off. What was 125-200 is up at 400 to 575 watts (I have just started riding I am not that strong). It must be my wind offset so I will do another cal ride to fix that. One problem I face is that there is not a very good place to do one that is not on a hill or along a highway. since I will be doing the cal ride again I will try to reset the unit by placing the battery in backwards and redoing my info. hopefully this will fix the wind cal oddity I am seeing.

The good and bad of Summit Co, Yes Vail Pass is a nice pleasant 45 mile ride RT from my house but It is still under snow. I do have Ute Pass just up the road form me though and that ride is already in good shape although a little rocky on the shoulders.

Thank you for the explanation on perception, I think I know it but sometimes you just need to be told

[lorduintah]

You should check your tilt, too. That can really throw a monkey wrench into watts. The wind cal "progress bar" may have gone fast if you made a double hit on the button and the nit thought you were aborting. Generally, I find when doing the Cal Wind, I cup my hand over the port and wait 5-10 seconds for things to calm down. Then I tap the center button to zero the offset. If you punch it, you can actually not get a very good zero - the sensor is "sensitive"!

It will also go crazy if you change the altitude after you start riding. If you need to do anything like this do a reset first - hold the center red button down until you see reset flashing on the screen, then press again to verify that is your intent.

The wind scaling can be checked pretty easily by riding a couple miles in one direction and then going back to the place you started along the same route. If you average bike speed and wind speed are the same or close, your scaling is not off.

The cal ride does not really care about a flat area to ride as long as you retrace where you went "out" and go "back" are along the same path and the weather/wind have not changed. It does work better in a low wind environment, but it can get pretty breezy in Summit County. As far as coast downs - I recall a nice stretch between Breckenridge and Frisco that is straight and fairly flat (Maybe too exposed to the wind, though) - right next to the highway between the two. You can do CDs in both directions along the same stretch and get those to help your aero and Crr.

Ute pass always had a lot of switchbacks and as you said rubble/rocks.

Tom