Just before Autumn arrived in Wigan, I ran my route again, made more difficult by the 50mph crosswind and the threat of rain. Here’s the fly-through:
In other news, Garmin have accepted my Forerunner 410 is faulty and it’s been sent back for exchange. We’ll see how long it takes…
I decided that I should go for a quick run this afternoon to make up for a mahoosive meal at Nando’s in Epsom last night – we won’t mention the cake and jelly at IKEA Croydon {shudder} – and knowing that it’s pasta and partying tonight.
So I chose a nice and easy 2 mile jog. I felt fine a mile into the route so carried on, and the same after a mile and a half so I decided I’d head on to the 2 mile mark before turning back. Worked well, I think.
Just a short run tonight as I’m still very sore from the crash and because it was late, between rain storms and just before dusk. Those are my excuses anyway!
As part of my new fitness drive, I took part today in the London Sky Ride: a loop from Tower Bridge to St James’s Park and back plus the two miles or so each way along the Thames Path from my apartment to Tower Bridge. Here are the stats:
It was looking overcast when I left but by the time I reached Tower Bridge, it had started raining and by the time I was on the route itself it was lashing down. The route was still very busy indeed with many cyclists not being aware I was coming up behind them fairly swiftly despite the regular stops to allow pedestrians to cross. By the time I was halfway around the ‘course’, I was absolutely soaked to the skin and my canvas Adidas trainers were full of rainwater and squelching – eeyyoo!
Not quite sure how I managed speeds of 112.8mph – see charts – or a max. speed of 64.8mph – see summary – but the rest is pretty accurate!
On my way home, I had an ‘off’ on the now-slippery Thames Path, landing heavily on my bad shoulder and also banging my head on the block paviors. Maybe a bike helmet might be a good idea after all? I crashed with sufficient force to buckle the front rim too, so I’ll need to get that fixed soon too.
Yes one year and a few days after I bought the Garmin i3 satnav unit, it’s effectively knackered.
The USB connector is also the port for charging the unit on the move and unfortunately the connector is only located by four tiny soldered points and as it’s plugged in when in the car and then out to remove it for security and then plugged in to update the Points of Interest (speed camera locations, for example), etc. (repeat ad infinitum).
The trouble with that is that – as in my case – the connector eventually gives way as it did for me on 2nd September and the unit cannot then be updated or charged, so I ended up spending a fortune on batteries on a recent round trip to Scotland.
It’s a real pity as the unit was fabulous.
I picked this unit up today. Halfords and Woolworths had the unit priced cheapest on their web sites, but neither would actually allow an order. When I rang Halfords, I was told the i3 was being discontinued, which would explain the price discounting I’d seen.
Lawks! It’s tiny: see the photo of it next to my Nokia 6230i for comparison.
It comes with the UK maps preloaded onto a teeny 128MB Transflash data card, a cigarette lighter 24V/12V power lead (it runs on 2x AA batteries otherwise), a USB cable and drivers CD, suction mount, dashboard mount (for the suction mount to fix to) and instruction booklet.
I had it working in under five minutes in my Ford Mondeo ST200 despite the heated windscreen elements (which can make things more difficult for the GPS, making it want an external antenna in some cases).
It took just a few seconds to set my home address and calculate a route home which it then reclaculated every time I deviated from it. The unit gives quite loud instructions and turn information and the volume can be altered or turned off. I used the “3D” view but there are two top-down views of the routing too and brightness, etc. can also be altered.
When I got home, I updated it for speed cameras, etc. The USB cable is used for modifying the maps and adding points of interest, such as speed camera locations which I downloaded from PocketGPSWorld and added to the unit in a few seconds using the downloadable Garmin POI Loader software.
As for on-bike use, the i3 is not marketed as a bike unit – it’s not rugged or waterproof but is claimed to be sunlight-readable which is handy. It fits in neatly-ish between and in front of the clocks using the sucker mount, but I’ll have to see if I can get a sturdier bar mount or something similar.
For an on-bike test, I wired up an accessory socket to the Kawasaki ZRX1200R and used the supplied cigarette lighter adaptor, running the cable from the accessory socket under the seat, under the tank and behind the clocks to the i3.
I then went for a ‘spirited’ ride to test it properly. In Map View mode, the i3 displayed the location map (with different levels of detail dependent apparently upon speed), the next junction at the top of the unit, the direction in the small box to the bottom right and – usefully – the current speed in the bottom left hand box. Even in direct sunlight, the screen was readable: I have a black visor too. I didn’t try it with the voice prompts (although there are two web sites with instructions on how to wire up a headphone socket and headphone) but found it easy enough to see the screen and the speed camera warnings.
The unit can show the planned route on a turn-by-turn basis, but on the downside, you can’t program any stops into your route or make it route via a certain road or town.
So, would I recommend it? Yes. Where can you buy one? That depends: there are a lot on eBay although prices of new ones remain high. Comet sell them too – I got mine there thanks to a discount I get – or you can buy one through my Amazon shop.
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