S9Peak with Suunto HR SmartSensor Also Failed

[TonyG]

After having issues with my S9Peak and Polar Belts I decided to get another Suunto Smart Sensor HR Belt (thats 3 Different Belts in the last 3 months: H10, H9 and Suunto SmartSensor) to try and eliminate the HR Belt Drops, The Suunto SmartSensor belt is supposed to have internal memory to record any drops.

Out for a run today and as I had the S9Peak with me I decided to use that as opposed to the S9Baro, and as per usual the S9Peak dropped the HR Connection; this time I could actually see it had dropped as there was no HR Displayed on the screen. this continued for 0.4km at least then picked back up.

I thought ok, the Suunto SmartSensor will record the missing bit internally but to my shock it didn’t: it continued to record a flat line of 153 (the last displayed value) for 0.4km approx;
as can be seen here on the sports tracker record

https://www.sports-tracker.com/workout/tonygray190/61cda3ae5c5a9a2e392a810e

open up the HR Graph and look between 5.3 km and 5.67km
also seen here on the Strava chart

I will wait until new firmware is released to see if there is any improvement on the HR side of things, but at this stage I think sending the S9Peak in for a replacement / service is on the cards.
But I am confused as to why the Brand New Suunto Smart Sensor didn’t record the actual HR for the dropped period. My Heart was definitely still beating???
Cotton t-shirt
Worn in Correct position
Used Conductive Gel (Electroden Gel for EKG, EEG, EMG & Defibrillation)

[Brad_Olwin]

@tonyg why Sportstracker? Can you post link for Suunto App? In winter if this is an easy activity and the HR belt gets very dry it is possible to lose HR.

[Egika]

I would tend to think that this is not a watch issue, but a belt issue.
If the belt don’t detect HR, then it will not store or transmit anything. The watch can’t help in this case.
Make sure you are wearing the belt correctly, moistening it well before use etc.

[Richard Thygesen]

I have the same problem with HR belts. Cant get them to work without dropouts during runs. It works perfectly with my Polar Verity Sense

[suzzlo]

@tonyg said in S9Peak with Suunto HR SmartSensor Also Failed:

But I am confused as to why the Brand New Suunto Smart Sensor didn’t record the actual HR for the dropped period.

I’m not sure (and probably I’m wrong) but I think there are only to ways to use HR:

• Stream HR data via bluetooth during activities
  or
• Store HR data and send when workout is completed

So not sure if the watch can detect HR drops and recover only “disconnected periods of data” when the activity finalizes.

Also if I check Suunto’s website “Whatever your sport, Suunto Smart Sensor measures your heart rate with great comfort and accuracy. While swimming, the sensor stores your heart rate data and transfers it wirelessly to your compatible Suunto sports watch” I still have same doubts.
https://www.suunto.com/Products/Heart-Rate-Belts/SuuntoSmartSensor/

Let’s jump to the User Guides https://www.suunto.com/Support/User-guides/?tab=4

Uhmmmm, there are 7 different user guides for HR belts… let’s read https://www.suunto.com/Support/Product-support/suunto_smart_sensor/suunto_smart_sensor/using-suunto-smart-heart-rate-belt/

So I was confused: “The memory function is also used to buffer data whenever the heart rate signal from Suunto Smart Heart Rate Belt to your Suunto sports watch is temporarily lost. Missing data is transferred as soon as the connection is restored.”

[TonyG]

@Brad_Olwin @egika thank you for taking the time to reply, I did use conductive gel (recommended by suunto) as mentioned in my first post, as well as sweating like mad, it was a record breaking temperature today a sweltering 13degC, I have also been using HR Belts from approx. 2007 with my good old T3c Hr watch and continued to use one with every exercise session since then (except for swimming) without any issues; until recently. I don’t think the position of the belt which is placed where its recommended to be fitted (just below the chest, slightly off centre to the left) is the cause.
I will however completely soak the strap with water tomorrow to see if that makes any difference, never had to do this in the past, just wetting my fingers and a quick rub on the sensor pads is all it took.
@Brad_Olwin - the suunto app link doesn’t show the Hr information in a graph (as far as I can see) it just does that moving map with min / max values for HR, Pace, altitude therefore you cant visually see what I was talking about or referencing, unless I am using the wrong link but its the only one I can find. The sportstracker db is the db for the app so makes no difference from a presentation point of view, the information enumerates exactly the same afaik.

[TonyG]

@richard-thygesen And the main difference is verity sense isn’t measuring / transmitting r-r and just transmits good old HR Value; I think - happy to be corrected on this one.

[TonyG]

@suzzlo indeed! it does beg the question, the belt stores R-R interval data but maybe not store standard HR Value. it does beg the question that @Egika posed with correct position, but as mentioned Ive been using Hr Belts for years and never had a problem, even with my old SmartSensor (which died) with ambit3Peak

[Brad_Olwin]

@tonyg I have a lot of data with the strap and not getting drop outs, either running or SkiMo. I typically check mine in TrainingPeaks as it provides a better view of the HR. Sorry for this, I don’t know why it is happening to you and should not be. Once I start sweating I do not lose HR. I will help to escalate this up for you. Try a couple more times.

Second, do you see after you stop the activity HR syncing in the watch? After each activity, I see a heart symbol with a circle rotating around it and text stating HR is syncing. This happens when I wear the belt. As with you, I have rarely ever had issues with the Smartsensor since my A3Peak.

[TonyG]

@brad_olwin said in S9Peak with Suunto HR SmartSensor Also Failed:

Second, do you see after you stop the activity HR syncing in the watch? After each activity, I see a heart symbol with a circle rotating around it and text stating HR is syncing. This happens when I wear the belt. As with you, I have rarely ever had issues with the Smartsensor since my A3Peak.

I didn’t check / notice on this occasion, but I didn’t consciously set out too; I will however check tomorrow. I have noticed that part of the ending of an activity in the past regardless of the belt type though, so not 100% sure its a reliable measure of whether the belt is sending additional data points to the watch.

[Richard Thygesen]

@tonyg correct!

[suzzlo]

@tonyg said in S9Peak with Suunto HR SmartSensor Also Failed:

it does beg the question, the belt stores R-R interval data but maybe not store standard HR Value

It makes no sense (for me), because, HR Belt is storing standart HR when you are using alone (or in “disconnected mode”) like when you are swimming.

Anyway, the best way could be, as @Brad_Olwin has told to escalate, sure experts at Suunto could help better.

BR

[TonyG]

@suzzlo thank you, Yeah I too am at a loss, I bought the Suunto belt for the memory to avoid this very situation, which in it self was a sticking plaster trying to get around an existing problem with S9 Series watches (not recovering from dropped R_R Packets), as such I feel very let down by Suunto products. TRUST is a big thing for me when it comes to watch tech especially when I spend what I consider to be premium money on their products.

Over the last 3 - 5 years (cant remember when I bought the spartan) I have bought from Suunto
Spartan Ultra Baro
1 Suunto Belt only
S9Baro
S9Peak
2 Watch straps @ £60 each (unbelievable cost)
1 Suunto SmartSensor
all told aprox. £1400 worth of products

Due to Hr issues, lack of website, abandonment of Spartan series (when so much was promised at launch) last night I bought
1 Coros Apex Pro (which I got as a sale bargain) - dip my toe elsewhere with another brand for the first time since 1997 see if the grass is any greener; maybe it is, maybe not - but I can’t justify spending money with Suunto at this time

[dulko79]

A bit off topic question concerning HR belt. Can Suunto sensor be bought without strap? I would like to buy strap in L size and additionally sensor. On Suunto website sensor is availabe only with strap in M size.

[DMytro]

@dulko79 in principle you could
https://www.suunto.com/de-de/Produkte/Herzfrequenzgurte/Suunto-Smart-Sensor-Modul/
but it seems, suunto no longer offers this option.
You may check out some second hand sensors though, I bought just the module on Ebay for 20 eur and then purchased the new strap in a store.

[Dimitrios Kanellopoulos]

@tonyg it’s ok to not spend money on Suunto and check Coros . I do wonder how the HR story goes over with Coros just out of interest. I don’t work on this department so I cannot help but as a developer that knows a bit about hr I am curious.

I hope you can come back after a few with some feedback about the 2 brands.

Enjoy your purchase. The coros apex pro is a good watch for sure !

Happy new year for now.

[TonyG]

@dimitrios-kanellopoulos Happy New Year all & @Dimitrios-Kanellopoulos you are very much a great asset to Suunto and its users
I will indeed do a comparison between the two brands
when I have tested thoroughly.
Best wishes

[dombo]

@tonyg if you still have polar H10, you can connect two devices at the same time, so you can see if other (coros) will display HR when S9P shows nothing.

[TonyG]

@dombo ah! Good point, definitely a good experiment

[margusl]

Whatever that issue was, seems that it started around 3.6km / minute 22 and looks like you also stopped there. Do you remember why or what did you do at that point? Added / removed layers, adjusted the HRM belt or something like that?

As Sports Tracker kindly shares pretty much all the workout details (kmh… down to the serial number of the watch… ) , I played around a bit with your HR and IBI values from that activity:
https://gist.github.com/marguslt/9608011e5aab4ff0f946097203da732a

Blue is unfiltered HR stream, orange is IBI(RR) dataset and green shows successive differences of IBI values (it’s actual mean is 0, but it was shifted to +0.34 for convenience ). Discrete IBI points are connected only to make changes in noise level more visible. Ofc no telling if/what kind of processing this data stream has been passed through. For example maximum IBI value was 60s, there’s no way it could be a random value - is this some kind of fallback for H10, for the watch or added later by Suunto services?

Kind of expected IBI & HR variation for first 22 minutes, then something drives it bananas until IBI stops and HR gets locked at whatever value it was at. Though no idea why it dropped where it did, readings seem get more stable minutes before and it’s actually the end where it gets really fuzzy.

Just for reference, this is how one of my activities recorded with A3P and H10 looks like (scales and axis ranges are different)

Width of the band showing successive ibi differences remains fairly stable regardless of heart rate, no sudden jumps.