Fenix 5 - Altimeter/Barometer Major Issues

Former Member over 7 years ago

Background:
I recently purchased the Fenix 5 watch around Christmas time. I live in Boulder, CO and do a lot of trail running, backcountry skiing, and general outdoor activities. I was a Suunto user for the past 5 years, but I wanted to give Garmin due to a variety of perceived upgrades. There are a lot of things I like about my move to Garmin, but a major issue seems to be surfacing regarding elevation reading and tracking. For the past few weeks I was under the impression that I didn't understand the Barometer/Altimeter settings and that this was likely the source of my problem. However, after trying different settings and reading information on these forums I've unfortunately concluded that regardless of what setting I have the elevation is simply never accurate.

Issue:
Inaccurate elevation reading and tracking throughout the day and during activities.

Most Recent Examples:
1) I calibrated my watch manually last night before bed. When I woke up, the elevation reading changed from approximately 5,300 ft to approximately -6,700 ft.
2) I calibrated my watch manually when I arrived at the office and since I have typed this message I've gained roughly 3,000 ft in elevation.
3) I went for a run and upon finishing my watch informed me that I gained roughly 2,700 ft when I know for a fact it was only 1,500 ft. This is really troubling since I'd hope that when GPS is on that the elevation would be accurate, but evidently this isn't the case.

On other random days I've looked at my watch and it has varied from -65,000 ft to 67,000 ft. I simply have no idea how it is even registering those types of elevations.

HELP!!!! This is a very frustrating issue. Am I correct to think my only option is to send the watch back to Garmin and hope to receive a replacement that has functioning sensors?

Any thoughts or suggestions are appreciated.

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0 AllanOlesen67 over 6 years ago

I have absolutely no idea which part of my post your "no" was directed at.

0 rinserepeat over 6 years ago

I believe the expectation for a $500+ flagship garmin to be able to self-calibrate to reasonable elevation awareness is not a wild expectation.

Cross-referencing GPS+GALILEO should give elevation to within 5 meters. There are already other brands that do this.

Also, you should be able to set a "home base" on the watch, at least one if not multiple locations, where you can teach the watch the true altitude of your home or workplace, so when it senses it is within a few meters of that location, it now knows the true elevation and can adjust where it thinks the elevation is at.

Garmin needs to put this on their existing watches and not wait until the 6, etc. or they are going to lose customers.

0 KrapfenKringel over 6 years ago

The watch doesn't actively know/check where it is, it has no idea if its outside for a GPS connection. Also its not really that good receiving its height, compared 2 watches that settled for 30m difference.

But yes, every-time you do GPS activities it could update the height. But then this would mess up a relative height chart you might want.

0 a1234.garmin over 6 years ago

It would be great to have an explanation from Garmin, if altitude from waypoints used for calibration or not in modern devices. Many years ago in FR920 it was a standard way to calibrate local altitude.
I.e. you can start activity and device will use waypoint information saved.
If YES, then everybody should check the stash with the waypoints saved, may be device uses these incorrectly saved data during calibration process.

https://www.dcrainmaker.com/2014/11/garmin-forerunner-920xt-depth-review.html
(search across the article words Altitude)
"Now some folks have seemed to find a tricky little workout to setting the elevation, which is to go ahead and save a waypoint at the current location with the correct altitude. Obviously, that requires you know the correct attitude, which is no doubt potentially a big ask."

0 rom2sainpan over 6 years ago

If I'm right, the fenix 5 actually does this calibration. My experience shows that the watch "remembers" some points (for example, just outside my house where I start most of the time my runs) with their altitude (that was calibrating the first time with GPS elevation) -> each time I run, as soon as I got he GPS fix and start my run, the barometric altitude is reset to the same value (and obviously, it is not coming from the GPS altitude each time, as I have a data field for both altitudes and most of the time, the GPS altitude is off at the begining while the barometric altitude is reset at the good value).

0 Former Member over 6 years ago

There was a post on another forum that claims that previous way-points are used as part of the activity start elevation fix if available. This leads me to believe there is a possibility of bad way-points stored on the watch in the cases where people have been able to perform a full factory reset and suddenly the altimeter starts working again. The way-point it tried do use may have stored a prior bad elevation.

With that said, a jump in altitude of a few thousand feet over a period of a day or a few hours when the watch has only moved a few feet would require a biblical storm. Assume the following if you see this:
1. There is crud in your barometer port. On the F5 it is on the 2-button side between the buttons. Clean as suggested. If a hair is in there, it can cause some interesting problems.
2. I suppose static electricity could be an issue. Though I have not had a problem all winter and I heat with wood. This means a dew-point around 0F, which means my house becomes a large static generator.
3. Broken or intermittent sensor. It is possible that some environmental issues during shipping have damaged the barometer sensor, or the sensor as shipped to Garmin has a manufacturing flaw.

0 Former Member over 6 years ago

With that said, a jump in altitude of a few thousand feet over a period of a day or a few hours when the watch has only moved a few feet would require a biblical storm.

Or the watch "thinks" there was a biblical storm. This past August I spent a few days in Vegas and my 935's barometer mode was set to "auto". On consecutive days the temperature reached 110 degrees Fahrenheit. While walking the strip and entering casinos with the AC at a balmy 68 degrees, my altitude was jumping up and down by hundreds of feet in a matter of a few minutes while my actual elevation change may have been 20 feet. I had to put the watch in barometer mode to stop this. Anyway, with it being the winter months in the northern hemisphere, I think a lot of these "faulty" barometers where people are seeing a couple hundred feet are along the same line; to a lesser extend of course, with people leaving warm homes/buildings and then going outside in the colder environment with the ambient temperature/pressure change.

0 Former Member over 6 years ago

Or the watch "thinks" there was a biblical storm. This past August I spent a few days in Vegas and my 935's barometer mode was set to "auto". On consecutive days the temperature reached 110 degrees Fahrenheit. While walking the strip and entering casinos with the AC at a balmy 68 degrees, my altitude was jumping up and down by hundreds of feet in a matter of a few minutes while my actual elevation change may have been 20 feet. I had to put the watch in barometer mode to stop this. Anyway, with it being the winter months in the northern hemisphere, I think a lot of these "faulty" barometers where people are seeing a couple hundred feet are along the same line; to a lesser extend of course, with people leaving warm homes/buildings and then going outside in the colder environment with the ambient temperature/pressure change.

In this case, many buildings with cooling have "positive pressure" in them to keep humid and hot air out, so that you will have a higher pressure inside than out. You will see this as a drop in elevation when you enter and close the door behind you. What complicates things is when people open and close doors, the pressure will jump all over the place as it equalizes and then re-pressurizes.

0 Former Member over 6 years ago

I'm familiar with how buildings are pressurized and it's affects on a barometric altimeter. I was giving an example and hoping in a subtle way that maybe someone who is calibrating their altimeter, not noting the ambient pressure prior to starting an outdoor run in much cooler/warmer temperatures, and then saying their barometer is broken because they ran a flat course and the elevation gradually rose or fell, or there was a 100' elevation difference from start to finish at the same location would have a "Wait a minute. Maybe there's something to this?" moment. :D

0 AllanOlesen67 over 6 years ago

There was a post on another forum that claims that previous way-points are used as part of the activity start elevation fix if available.

For the Fenix 3, this was proved not to be the case. I don't know if it has changed in later models.

What was found for the Fenix 3, and seems to have been continued in later models, is a memory of earlier altimeter calibrations.

So if the altimeter was once calibrated at a known location, and you started an activity again at that location (giving the GPS time to get a fix before starting the activity), the altimeter would calibrate itself to the stored altitude.

Unfortunately, not only manual calibrations were stored. Automatic calibrations were also stored. So if you had the watch set up to automatically calibrate the altimeter at the start of a session, and you started a session at a new location, the watch would auto calibrate the altimeter from GPS and then add this location/altitude pair to the memory. So if the GPS altitude was wrong, you would get the same wrong altitude the next time you started a session at that location. Anyway, as soon as you did a manual calibration at that location (with GPS enabled) this would replace the old value in the memory, so future sessions would use the manual altitude.

As far as I know, this functionality was never documented by Garmin. It was discovered by users, and some details are still unknown, for example if there is any limit to the number of location/altitude pairs which can be saved.