Guest Paul (MVP) Posted June 17, 2008 Report Share Posted June 17, 2008 Review: http://www.mytodayscreen.com/review-hymini/ P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest hotphil Posted June 18, 2008 Report Share Posted June 18, 2008 My Herbert Richter bike mount arrived this morning. Looks good - it can be twisted too so I can mount it exatly how I want. I've managed to mount my turbine in a very good place which means it's out of the way (had to lose the bell from my handlebars though). Only concern is that the phone may jump out of the holder. I'm toying with three solutions, either to put a rubber band round it (tacky, obtrusive), or put some kind of foam pad in the holder so that the phone doesn't slide up so easily (increase the friction), or possibly put a wrist strap (from my camera) through the lanyard holder on the phone and loop it round the handlebars. I think I like the last option best - it's unlikely with my riding that I'd encounter such a bump to jar the phone loose, but if I were to do so it would just dangle from the handlebars and doesn't obstruct the screen at all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest lozzd Posted June 18, 2008 Report Share Posted June 18, 2008 But if you go flying off your bike, you bring your phone with you :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest shootydogthing Posted June 18, 2008 Report Share Posted June 18, 2008 How? the strap isn't attacked to him at all, as far as I can see... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest hotphil Posted June 19, 2008 Report Share Posted June 19, 2008 Yep, the wrist strap is looped round the handlebars. Seemed to work quite well on the commute in this morning using CoPilot's 'walking' mode. It jumped in the cradle a couple of times (down kerbs/potholes (Sheffield won a poll recently for the worst roads in the country as the council hadn't resurfaced a single road in 10+ years - don't know where the money went...)). I think for piece of mind on long journeys I will stick a rubber band round it too. The turbine merrily charged away and I got to work with my phone fully charged. I think I may have found my solution! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Paul (MVP) Posted June 19, 2008 Report Share Posted June 19, 2008 Sweet! :D P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest lozzd Posted June 19, 2008 Report Share Posted June 19, 2008 Ah it would help if I read! Sorry! :D The turbine thing is super awesome though! Can't believe you get enough power to charge your phone! ace! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest hotphil Posted June 20, 2008 Report Share Posted June 20, 2008 I'm not sure the turbine itself will give enough power to charge the phone, but it contains a 1000mAh battery that it trickle charges. If I set off for a whole day with the Kaiser and the turbine fully charged, I really hope I get a whole day out of it. I will let you know (assuming I don't get lost in the Peak District due to not having enough power!). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest WearTheFoxHat Posted June 20, 2008 Report Share Posted June 20, 2008 I know with TomTom you can turn the screen off, and just have directions. This might save some power. Although you may look a bit of an idiot cycling along hearing Jane say "In 5-hundred yards ... turn left". "You have reached your destination!" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest hotphil Posted July 1, 2008 Report Share Posted July 1, 2008 (edited) Well I made it to the Peak District. Then I made an error. I turned the screen off. I forgot that three times on two different devices I've done that before and the result is that the CoPilot folder in Program Files wipes itself. Gone. Kaput. Empty. And wouldn't reinstall. I swore. Luckily I had a data connection so could use Google Maps to navigate, but when CoPilot wiped itself I was in a village that I didn't have paper maps for because I'd plotted a pretty peculiar route. The upshot was that I couldn't tie up my location on Google Maps with my memory of the route I wanted and took a wrong turn and had to cycle uphill for an hour to arrive at a pub I'd left nearly two hours earlier. More swearing. Combined with a 20mph headwind the whole day it took me 6 hours to do 28miles. Shocking. Coming back yesterday took 2.75hours. The cradle and turbine worked well and I easily got a whole day out of the two combined (was impressed considering I had the phone connection on for Google Maps after CoPilot crashed). Couple of things to watch for: if you have a wireless trip computer, the turbine seems to interfere with it when charging a device (resolve by either not charging device or moving trip computer further away). Second, watch out for the USB cable coming loose. Minor niggles (especially compared to the rubbish CoPilot), on the whole I was very happy with my handlebar mount/turbine setup. Edited July 1, 2008 by hotphil Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Paul (MVP) Posted July 1, 2008 Report Share Posted July 1, 2008 Question is tho, how much juice was left in the turbine aftwards? I would have thought with no wind at all there wouldn't be far off enough power in the turbine battery to run all day? P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest hotphil Posted July 1, 2008 Report Share Posted July 1, 2008 Even with a 20mph headwind going through it all day (plus whatever speed I was doing), the 'charging' indicator on the phone stopped after 5 hours. But the phone was fully charged and good for another few hours I would have thought. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Paul (MVP) Posted July 2, 2008 Report Share Posted July 2, 2008 Hmmm, interesting! HotPhil, do you want to test the Solar panel too? I have one here... :D P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest hotphil Posted July 2, 2008 Report Share Posted July 2, 2008 That's cool. I actually wrote to them to see where I could get one from as I couldn't find a UK distributor. I'd happily try it out and provide some feedback. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Paul (MVP) Posted July 2, 2008 Report Share Posted July 2, 2008 Cool, PM me your address. P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest scotstic Posted July 8, 2008 Report Share Posted July 8, 2008 Just in case anyone is still looking for a good solution to mounting devices to MTB hadlebars / stems... I had a similar quest to find something I could use to mount to my satnav to my MTB handlebars. Some of the products I did find were either really product specific (Garmin), only suitable for non OS sized bars (i.e. not 31.8mm), or were just plain weak and I was worried that my satnav would drop and smash... In the end, I bought a cheap bike lock, that has a strong, plastic jubilee clip type thing for mounting the lock to your bike frame. It has 2 x straps and is designed to carry a fair bit of weight, so you can tighten it up and know that it's not going anywhere. http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/Models.aspx?ModelID=12252 I used a hack-saw to cut down the mounting bracket so that all that was left was the plastic jubilee clip and a flat surface, which I was able to use and fix the satnav mounting bracket to with a couple of screws and a bit of strong glue. I have used this mount to cover hundreds of miles off-raod and it works perfectly! You also get a free lock for your efforts! The other benefits are that you can mount your device to your stem rather than the bars, and it is pretty easy to remove when you don't want to use it / leave it on your bike. I'm happy to post a link to some pics if anyone wants more info. I now plan to adapt the mount now for my HTC tytn II - will need a waterproof case though... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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