Cateye inaccurate??

[spotlightmama]

During my triathlon, I noticed that my Cateye wasn't reading any MPH. It was on, but wouldn't do a reading. I thought maybe it was because I had racked my bike the night before and it was water damage or something.

I took my bike to the LBS the next day and asked if he knew anything about Cateyes. His response was, "I know they're confusing." Great. I told him my issue and he said he thought he could fix that. So he tightened up the sensors and it started reading a speed. Great! I'm on my merry way when a few minutes later, I realize that it is reading waaaay too fast of a speed (like 10 mph above what I think I'm riding).

DH recalibrated the thing last night, and now it's back to not reading any mph at all.

Any ideas?

[bike4ever]

How old is this computer? Which model Cateye? New battery?

[spotlightmama]

Ahhh....new battery. Doh - didn't even think of that! That very well may be the issue. It's a Cateye Astrale CC-CD100, so I imagine it's relatively old. I bought my bike used and it did come with the bike. Maybe that's it!

[VeloVT]

yeah, sounds like batteries. on my Cateye the display will flash zeros when I'm low on batteries, but different models may differ... you need to replace both the sensor batteries and the computer head batteries at the same time... for my model (double wireless) batteries last about one year... on mine, you have to do a reset/resyncing of the head & transmitter after replacing the batteries (my guess is you only have to do this with wireless models). of course, the battery-replacing instructions and the reset/sync instructions are many pages away from each other in the manual, but once you figure it out it's not too hard .

That must have been super frustrating, to have your computer on the fritz during a race. It drives me totally crazy if it's not working even when I'm just going for a quick easy ride. I actually get sort of anxious if I don't know how fast I'm going... it just feels like something is wrong.

(Hi, my name is Liza and I'm hopelessly dependent on my bike computer).

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

New battery. Been there. They don't stop working all at once- they start going nutty slowly. :-D

[DebW]

When you replace the battery, remember to re-enter your data on wheel circumference to get accurate numbers.

[Peanut03]

My wireless Cateye has been great, except for the max speed. It is always way higher than it should be, and I made sure that it is calculating MPH, not KPH. I haven't figured out the issue yet. Anyone else have this problem?

[Eden]

My wireless Cateye has been great, except for the max speed. It is always way higher than it should be, and I made sure that it is calculating MPH, not KPH. I haven't figured out the issue yet. Anyone else have this problem?

The wireless one can be affected by things - especially the induction loops in the ground at red lights. Look down sometime when you are stopped at one and you may see your speed reading out a rather quick pace when you are actually standing still.

[Becky]

My wireless Cateye has been great, except for the max speed. It is always way higher than it should be, and I made sure that it is calculating MPH, not KPH. I haven't figured out the issue yet. Anyone else have this problem?

Interference from power lines, radio towers, etc.? DH and I noticed this on our last ride- his max speed (on his wireless cateye) was 64 mph, while mine (on my wireless VDO) was only 35 mph. My computer is digital wireless, while DH's is analog.

Just a theory....I can't prove any of this...

[Peanut03]

Very interesting, thanks for the input. Maybe it's time to get a new computer! I should have done that when I got my new bike anyway!