Elite Direto if the price is right would you consider?

No workie for me. Looks like in erg mode mine gives wrong speed readouts. Resistance mode seems to be fine. Gonna ping TR support to further look at my files.

The wired elite cadence sensor GREATLY helps the trainer respond faster, as does riding in granny gear.

Are you sure itā€™s this slow? I thought the same on my Direto but then realized what I thought was a 8-10 second delay is actually 4-5 seconds while resistance ramps up and then TR is averaging this so depending on your power smoothing value, youā€™ll have to wait that long once target power is hit before it shows the correct target power.

Iā€™ve been happy with mine, I wouldnā€™t mind a snappier 2-3 second (or tunable) response but Iā€™ve had no noticeable issues with wandering power.

Note: Direto to MacBook Pro connection via BTLE with a Garmin cadence sensor.

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Elite customer service is appalling. In my experience a 5 day response time and a response that told me to try again, that I just have been doing something wrong. If you get one and have no problems you might be ok.

Mine got taken back to store.

You are welcome Tezz.

To the various comments and questions

If you want to try this on your Direto, (Or any other trainer) go to the elite MyEtraining software, or TR or Zwift workouts and make a simple custom workout.

  • 1 min@130W
  • 30sec @350W
  • 30sec @130W
  • 30sec @350W
  • 30sec @130W
  • 30sec @350W
  • I min @130W
    If you have the same problems/experiences, this will show it up.

IanDarlington

  1. I am using a ā€œGranny wheelā€. Middle ring of triple and middle of cassette. Make that 39/15 or so.
  2. I am sure it is this slow. The Guy from the UK distributor said he could hear the stepper in the motor starting to respond as I described it, 3-4 seconds after the interval started.
  3. Also I am waiting for the feel of resistance. There is almost none if I start to push immediately. Also when the power is supposed to drop from 350W to 130W I can definitely feel the power is held on 350 for 3-4 seconds before it starts to transition downwards.
    4.The smoothing value seems to make no difference. I read a load on the Elite forums and I have tried 0 and 10 and 2 and 5. I think this is merely a reporting of the power rather than the actual power. I reset it to the original value.

I should emphasise it is not that I am looking at ā€œTR averagingā€ but feeling when there is actually a resistance change. There is none for 3-4 seconds ā€“ then it respondsā€¦ the transitionā€¦ over 7-9 seconds.

Reading through some of the forums, here and elsewhere, I am sure people are finding differences over time. There was one where a Drivo 1 was responsive but a Drivo 2 was not. (Basically same internals I suspect).

Bherbers:
Other trainers.

  • I tried a kickr 2018. Admittedly (frustratingly) they could only demo it using a phone to control the power. It was quite different. I watched the Lamalab demo of him pushing through to change power from 100 to 300W and that is exactly what I could do. No appreciable delay (perhaps a second or 2) but power I could push against.
  • I tried a Tacx Neo, but the shop only had it in Zwift sim mode and did not understand how to put in into erg mode.
  • I do which I had tried a kickr or kickr core in erg mode before I bought the Direto.

The delay and smoothing

  • Of course you want some transition delay, between power levels, otherwise it would be like hitting a brick wall. My point is that there is a long transition time AND a long delay after the interval before the transition starts. Try counting 1ā€¦., 2ā€¦., 3ā€¦., 4. and then the trainer starting to change resistance, up or down.
  • The artificial smoothing of power on the kickr ā€“ is that how it reports things, rather than the actual power? (That was my impression). That were I to have power pedela on it would show a greater fluctuation that the kickr was reporting.

Patrickfledge

  • Using The elite cadence sensor. Interesting. I am reluctant to through another Ā£40 at the trainer. But are you saying that before you had the elite cadence sensor you had a delay, (and which ones) but that after fitting it, that one or both of the delays were reduced?

I am not denying that others find the Direto satisfactory. But I donā€™t and there is a definite problem. One that I could replicate easily on a different Direto of the same age used by the UK distributor for their demos. I am simply warning that

  1. I am having a definite problem with one that is supposed to be a direto 2 and was made in Oct 2018, and
  2. Elite are not the quickest, most responsive organisation to deal with (far from it).
  3. That the DCRainmaker review omits this issue, and I donā€™t want people to be as frustrate as I am.
  4. I am still waiting for this Board. Given they cannot do firmware upgrades on the elite (another reason to avoid it I think) then IF (Big IF) this makes a difference, it would suggest either a board deign or firmware issue. But the jury is still out on that.

Just to confirm I am using PC & ANT+FE or whatever it is called :blush:

I am very tempted to sell it on and get either a kickr core or last season Neo.

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Just so everybody can see a visual representation of power lag here is the last warmup interval of the Clark workout. Top graph is the Direto. Bottom graph is the Kickr. Both workouts taken from random folks who made their data available on TrainerRoad. Thanks random folks!

The Direto ramps from 99 to 494 over the course of about 5 seconds.

The Kickr ramps from 119 to 595 over the course of about 2 seconds.

So there you go. Iā€™m sure if we dig through more workouts weā€™ll find more examples but these two seem to be illustrative based on what Iā€™m reading in this thread.

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Hereā€™s a Tacx Neo. Gets the job done in about 3 seconds.

Tacx_Neo

Brennus, That is really useful. Thanks. What it does illustrate for me is that this example Direto does not start to ramp up for 3 seconds after the TR signal and then starts to transition. Whereas the kickr stats its ramp up almost immediately. Also you can see how the Direto hangs onto its power after the end, whereas the kickr ramps down.

I am assuming that the curve represents the persons ability to put power against that increased resistance. This is where the problem lies for meā€¦ if you start too early you simply spin up and end up at 110rpm, in the higher power and have to manage your cadence down.

I also note that the TR signal starts 2 seconds before the segment, as reported elsewhere.

Iā€™m just looking at Kickr, Direto, Neo, Wattbike, Vortex, couple otherā€¦

Seems like Direto is the slowest for sure. Kickr is the fastest for sure. Everybody else seems like they are in that 3 to 4 second range.

Interesting. TR makes a lot, a lot of data publicly available. I think I could start a side biz just scraping TR data and packaging it.

So, what should I say about my Drivo II which I paid 1200 Euro.
It was Clark Workout. Elite support responds very slow, they donā€™t know how to help. Software has a lot of issues, elite app sucks, is ā€¦out of word; updades doesnā€™t come to trainers. I havenā€™t recived it do my Drivo I since I was bought it.
I shoud have bought NEO or KICKR 18 :frowning:

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Iā€™m not sure how I feel about the way the Kickr artificially smooths the power to make it look perfect. Maybe itā€™s just because Iā€™m so use to my jagged power line from my KK/PM combo.

Ardian, that is exactly what my Direto feels like. Delay doing nothing for 3-4 seconds, then a slow transition. Thanks.

I know Chad says for these intervals use resistance mode, and I am sure he is right. However, even for a long interval, several mins, it is a frustrating start.

I just wonder if some of these examples are in resistance mode? Are they showing what someone actually put out in response to the change? or what they were able to put out given the way the turbo responded.

I am curious, what manufacturing date is on the bottom. Mine is Oct 2018.

Drivo 2 I bought month ago in October(18). In resistance mode I always donā€™t know what percent of resistance I should choose so I donā€™t use it. Once is to strong and heavy , or is too easy and resistance level is not enough, then I have to find proper gear. It is frustrating. I will try for check it but I spent these money mailny for great ERG mode, not for changing gears manually.

2017 Elite Direto@ERG, connected by ANT+ USB Dongle to Win Laptop.
Feels ok to me, but got no real comparison to other trainers.

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Looks like I am up to the mark in 3 sec on most intervals and resistance kicks in 1 sec after the interinterval starts.

I have tried with an external cadence sensor and erg mode was an absolute mess with super slow response times and a ton of spikes above and below. With high ā€œwheel speedā€ it was a mess.

Slowest chain speed + wired cadence sensor plugged in to my version one drivo and I am happy. Before that I was super angry and wanted to return it. The v2 units are supposed to be faster, so I would suggest finding a way to borrow a wired sensor from a friend or store, and using the easiest gear you can (I donā€™t use my largest cog because of noise, I use one down)

See if you feel an appreciable difference or not.

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Screenshot_20181222-190151

Just started using my direto on Thursday. Is whatā€™s happening to me in these images just because Iā€™m a newb to erg mode? Definitely a huge delay, like over the whole minute, never hitting the target.

Iā€™m just annoyed that it appears as though I failed my last ā€œoverā€ even though I had some left in the tank and was ramping up cadence higher and higher with no resistance, consistently under target :rage: then other intervals (such as the ā€œundersā€) Iā€™m well over!

Please help :pray:

I have a Direto and I havenā€™t experienced this before so I may not be able to help too much. Did you give it a spin down calibration?

Edit: Your issue isnā€™t a cadence issue but perhaps this may help outā€¦

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I did the spin down calibration 2 days ago. I should be doing it before every ride, correct?

Also, I have stages L/R power meter I use for my cadence and power. I wonder if I should disconnect that and just do the trainer since they appear to have the same numbers.

I will also trying turning Bluetooth off through my Mac and just using ant+ since that is what my heart rate is through. I want to try it a TR workout on my phone to see if it responds the same but my HR is ant+ and I really like seeing the HR data even though it doesnā€™t usually mean anything, heh

Iā€™m not sure it would account for a full minute but in erg mode counterintuitive you sometimes need to slow your cadence slightly to allow the trainer to find the right level.

If youā€™re constantly upping the cadence it will also be constantly adjusting as well to try to compensate.

Iā€™ve had no issues with my Direto. I guess itā€™s like cars, sometimes you get a lemon.