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Issues with Charging/Charger?

Former Member over 6 years ago

My vivoactive 3 music has been working flawless since I've had it. Over the weekend I left it to charge and realized that the battery full drained and did not charge.

After more inspection, it seems the charger was "woobly" in connection with the battery connection, which means it wasn't making proper connection. When I pressed down on the charger, the contact seems to be more secure and the watch proceeded to charge. When I released pressure, it stopped charging.

It seems that there might be something wrong with either the charger itself (easy fix) or the connection on the watch (not sure about fix?). I went ahead and ordered a different charger from amazon, but was wondering if anyone had any experience with this kind of issue, and can pinpoint where exact the problem is? I've already inspected both contacts on the watch and the charger, and have cleaned them. There was no lint or dirt or anything preventing the charging. It seems the charger is not making a tight enough connection with the watch.

Thanks

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0 Former Member over 4 years ago in reply to Former Member

Thanks for the tip. The pin on my charger cord was stuck. It is now working

0 BANDAARR over 4 years ago

Unfortunately, I bought 2 of these for my kids. Both have charging issues and it is clearly a bad design and/or construction on the connection between cable and device. I have many Garmin devices including Edge and Fenix and the quality of the Vivoactive 3 is significantly substandard. I'm going to attempt to return them for replacements. Garmin - the customer experience with these devices, purchasing additional cables, cleaning with buds and alcohol, fiddling with cable connections, checking spring pins, dealing with frustrated teenagers (!) is not one that makes you want to return to purchase another device!

0 Former Member over 4 years ago

We have two Vivoactive and they are BOTH having this issue. We have several charging cords and a charging station. Still have issues. Cleaned with alcohol. Still have issues. Blow out with air. Some relief but issues right back.

0 Former Member over 4 years ago

I too have the same problem and had done the same as what you tried out. tried with a new cable but problem still persists. the spring action and the pins on the cable seems to be ok.

0 hhasert over 4 years ago in reply to Former Member

I used a (electrical) tooth brush on the contacts in the watch and cable to clean them, seems to have improved since then. A lot of sweat accumulates on the contacts (even though I wipe them regularly). The actual area of contact seems small and even though charging worked better after cleaning with cloth/alcohol I still did not get a stable usb device connection. I notices that switching the cable left-to-right also sometimes gave better contacts, but after cleaning that is now gone again.

0 Garmin-AmberD over 4 years ago in reply to Former Member

Hello! Are you charging through the wall or the computer? Have you tried both by chance?

0 hhasert over 4 years ago in reply to Garmin-AmberD

Mostly on my computer, during holidays I used a charger. I cleaned the contacts before since I had some issues on the charger as well at first.

0 3633373 over 4 years ago

After nursing this charging DESIGN FAULT for months and months with WD40, new cables, alcohol, scratching the contacts with a penknife, praying, wishing and hoping, I finally gave up on this pile of poo and threw it in the bin. Garmin, how about addressing this issue instead of bombarding my inbox with adverts for more of your mistakes?

0 4471290 over 4 years ago in reply to Former Member

My vivo active 3 has steadily be acting goofy and the charging cable had to be sitting just perfectly for it to work.

Tried the above suggestion with WD40 and used a paperclip to push the springs a few times each.

Connecting the cable to the watch felt correct again.

Thanks for this remedy !

0 J Kingsbury over 4 years ago

I've had exactly the same problem, there appears to be an issue with the contact between the cable and the connectors. Was working flawlessly until a few months ago. I'm going to contact Garmin as this is clearly not an isolated issue.