Fenix 6x Elevation Fault - HELP & SUPPORT needed

Hi, 

I've had my Garmin 6x sapphire since May 2020 and to me, it clearly has a fault. I spoke to Garmin customer services for 2 hours on webchat on Friday but they were trying to tell me there is no fault and the elevations are completely within the specs of the watch. But I'd like your opinions, I think they're trying to fob me off.

I have attached 3 elevation plots from recent runs. In each of them between the 15-20 minute mark, you can see the elevation spiking up and down all the way through to the end. This is why I'm getting these crazy elevation gain/drop figures when I finish my runs. All runs once the elevation correction is enabled drop the elevation figure many hundreds of metres each time. These are the unedited run data. 

The first picture was a completely flat 10k run with 2 friends also with Garmin watches. They both had 6M elevation gain at the end, I had 222M! I sent Garmin their data and they told me mine looks the same. They were telling me it was due to one spike in elevation which clearly isn't true. Another excuse was environmental factors, which I replied it was a perfectly clear day, no buildings, no wind and my friends Garmin's acted perfectly. How 6M - 222M is within specs of the watch is complete rubbish, that's a 3600% difference.

Apparently, a manager is going to ring me but I have been told they are not technically trained. To me, you don't have to be technically trained to see my watch has a fault. Whether I'll even get a call back is another thing. I was not happy with how I was addressed by Garmin at all. 

Look forward to hearing all your thoughts.

10k Flat

  • Yes, it might be a production lot of faulty sensors which I had the unlucky to fall in twice... perhaps same as other people that in the forum had the same.

    Nevertheless there is something defective which is clearly causing the barometer altimeter, which I paid, useless. And for a trail runner this makes my Fenix 6X Sapphire good for nothing.

    Just the last example of my run of today. 13Km with a quote gain of 308 meter when it's mostly flat with 90m reals or so. But all the runs are the same, and even worst, all visible and documented on Garmin Connect. Consistently after 20/24 minutes the altimeter profile gets crazy.

    With that given, what is really making me crazy and doubting of GARMIN, IS TO NOT HAVE ANY FEEDBACK from them, after I documented, call and sent all the supporting documentation. And also get words from the call center (Italy) that nobody opened claims on Altimeter.

    Absolute silence.

    Now I'm thinking to start collecting name and contacts in the forum of whom have the same to have numbers to raise a big voice with Garmin.

  • Hi Paolo, unfortunately you can put me on the list as well. Have you received any reply from Garmin since then ?

  • I've had the spike problem a lot of times during summer. Sended report to beta team in August.

    I've tested everything that's been discussed here and in other threads.

    Now when it's colder and I'm running with the watch outside of shirt or jacket, my elevation graphs are smooth and nice again.

  • Surprise surprise.. the weathers got warmer and now I’m getting all this spikey elevation data again. There is clearly a fault with these watches.

  • There is clearly a fault with these watches.

      

    Not for all though.

  • Clearly not for all. When did you purchase your watch? I'm wondering if there's been a change. I'm on the latest 15.20 software but whenever I run in warm weather it messes with my data.. as you can see.

  • I just checked mine and I can see also spikes. I'm running on 16.70 fw but I checked other versions and seems to me that on 16.10 was fine.

    The other versions also created spikes. True I can compare just two different hikes running. 

    Top 16.70 and the bottom is 16.10

  • Garmin are still trying to tell me there’s nothing wrong with this watch. Watch data elevation 143M, corrected elevation is 11M. Around 30 minutes in of every run I get issues. They will not answer my question to why this happens around the same time. Ignored in every response I get from them.

    Debating whether to go to go to citizens advice for this.