EatSleepRide App

[rscottlow]

I just downloaded EatSleepRide for my iPhone after reading this article on revzilla about using an Apple Watch for motorcycling.

https://www.revzilla.com/common-tread/why-the-apple-watch-is-a-great-motorcycle-accessory

Since the app is also available on iPhone and I'm riding quite a bit more this year, I went ahead and downloaded it. So far it looks pretty good. It automatically detects when you're riding, records your ride and measures lean angle. The app is free, but for 15 bucks a year you can add a feature which detects a crash. If you don't dismiss the crash alert within a specified (and I assume adjustable) time, it alerts your emergency contact. I'll probably purchase that after I test the app for a little while, if I like it.

Has anyone used this app? What do you think of it?


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[dominickbuff]

I'll give it a try thx

[Watcher]

There is a similar app for Android called FUSAR.  Does a lot of the same things like log rides, detects lean angle, all that, but it also lets you make group rides and supports chat within.

You can buy (or presumably adapt) a push to talk button you mount to your bars, everyone connects to their phone via their Bluetooth, and everyone connected to the group can now hear each other.
This is good if you have more than 4 people, which is the maximum Sena can support, and it has unlimited range since it uses cell signal rather than simple Bluetooth so you don't need to worry about daisy-chaining the signal to hear the lead rider a quarter mile away.

[rscottlow]

It looks like FUSAR is available for iPhone as well. I'm downloading it now. I'm going to use them side-by-side for a couple of weeks and see how they compare. I used ESR on my way into work this morning - the ride recording shows total distance ridden, total time ridden, and elevation. It also shows a graph of speed as a function of time, and if you swipe left or right through the graph it shows all of the data collected at each data point (which appear to be pretty frequent). It shows average and max speeds, min and max elevation, and left and right max lean angle. It has a group function which allows you to see other riders in your group on the map, but this also makes your location public (which can be disabled) as well as a button to find nearby riders, saved routes, and "places" which I've not yet experimented with. You can save "places" but I'm still unsure whether those are private or public (I'm thinking they're public), and you can classify those as Restaurant/Cafe, Gas Station, Hotel, Mechanic, Scenic Reststop, Racetrack, Bar, Speed Trap, or Other. You can set this to auto-record your rides, but it doesn't appear to be able to differentiate between riding and driving so if you enable that feature you'll have to go back and filter through your saved "rides" and delete any time spent behind the wheel for a data set that is at all useful. The other option would be remembering to start the recording before you get on the bike each day.

My initial thoughts are that this app could prove useful, especially if you ride the same route frequently or if, like me, you're interested in quantifying rider improvement. I can also see this being useful for going on group rides especially on unfamiliar roads. Last weekend I went out with a big group and we hit some roads I'd never ridden before, but would be interested in riding again. It would be easy to go back and pinpoint those on the map after the ride.

After downloading FUSAR and taking a quick look at it, the user interface doesn't feel quite as friendly to me, but my initial thought is that it's because it offers more features. Plus I had some time to experiment with ESR last night so I'm a little more familiar with it. FUSAR appears to offer almost everything that ESR offers, but with no additional cost for the crash alert (but it doesn't automatically send notification; you have to do that manually) and some additional features such as the ones Watcher mentioned above. More to come...

EDIT: I've been playing with the app a little more this morning, and the lean angle doesn't seem to calculate correctly with the phone in my pocket. I assume because i pocket my phone upside down, it shows my left turns as right lean angles and vice versa. I'm hoping that once I buy a phone mount for my handlebars, this will be corrected. The developers claim that it "self-calibrates" after going straight for 20 seconds, but it doesn't seem to correct for the phone being upside down.

ANOTHER EDIT: I found the following post from the app creator on another motorcycling forum regarding lean angle calculations: "In terms of getting an accurate reading for lean angle, we recommend keeping your phone in your pocket, top side up. This is so we can get accurate data readings but is also in case the rider gets separated from their bike, if you are using CrashLight." It sounds like my original thought was correct, which would force me to change my habit of putting my phone in my pocket upside down, and that's pretty unlikely because I'm weird about things like that. Hopefully the x-grip mount will take care of that problem. The developers say not to do this even though it results in more accurate lean angle monitoring. They say that it creates rider distraction, plus they'd prefer to have the phone with the rider rather than with the bike in the event that the CrashLight feature is triggered. Since there's no chance of me tumbling down a mountain in Ohio, I'm not too worried about that.

[Suzi Q]

I have ESR, diablo super biker and twisty road finder, but havent yet used.

[Watcher]

Cool, rscott, I'm interested to see what you like/dislike about either in comparison.

I have FUSAR but other than a few hours of setting it up I never actually used it.
Turns out the lean angle calculator doesn't like landscape orientation so I never tried it out, but they may have updated it since, it's been some months.

[rscottlow]

I found several updates that ESR posted regarding the best use of the app. They say to put the phone upright in a breast pocket for optimal results - this keeps the phone in the appropriate position, and also attached to your body in order to eliminate the problem of the phone careening over a cliff with the bike (as opposed to with the rider). I'm going to try that on my way home today, and I'm going to use both apps simultaneously and compare results.

I found an x-grip today for $11 shipped, so I should get that sometime in the next couple of weeks to see how it affects things. It should really allow me to get the most out of the app as well, since you really need to be able to see the screen to utilize all of the features.

[rscottlow]

Unfortunately I got stuck behind an Explorer with a top speed of 38 MPH for the best portion of my ride home so my data collected today is not terribly useful.

Little to report after the first simultaneous test, other than that I got more data that is easier to analyze on ESR than on FUSAR. I haven't been able to figure out how to view the data from each data point on FUSAR yet. I believe it's doable, but I'm still having trouble finding it. As I mentioned earlier, this can be done by swiping left or right across the graph on ESR. I noticed that ESR has more data points, as it detected greater lean angles and max speed than FUSAR, but FUSAR allows the ability to increase the frequency of data collection (at the expense of battery life). I've updated it to "aggressive" which is the setting with the max frequency of data points.

I haven't tested the CrashLight feature on ESR, because it only activates when it detects a crash while riding. Also because it's $14.99 a year, and I'm not convinced I want to spend that just yet. The emergency alert feature on FUSAR is a little different. It has options to either alert your riding group (I believe through their linked FUSAR app), or to alert preset emergency contacts via text message and email by pressing the alert button in the app. It sends your coordinates and the phone numbers for the three nearest emergency dispatchers. The problem with this is that it's not automatic, so if the rider cannot get to the phone, nothing is sent. It would be easier for me to dial 911 if I needed emergency dispatch, than to press the button in the app. And if I were to activate the emergency alert, my wife is just going to text or call me to ask if I'm alright. I suppose if I didn't respond she would call for me, but that seems unlikely if I'm able to activate the feature in the app.

I'm still very undecided about which app I'm going to keep. If I had Bluetooth accessories, I'd be sold on FUSAR, but right now the data I've obtained from ESR and its user-friendliness has it in the lead as far as I'm concerned. They're comparable enough that I'm going to continue testing both for a while to see if there's a clear winner. Anyone else with any experience with either of these apps?


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[mysho22]

Thanks for sharing this! I'm going to give it a try, it sounds very interesting.

The crashlight thing also sounds very cool. My community of riders hit the twisties in the mountains all the time, which is great to have this for. I may invest in this, and ask my partner to as well.

[rscottlow]

Thanks for sharing this! I'm going to give it a try, it sounds very interesting.

The crashlight thing also sounds very cool. My community of riders hit the twisties in the mountains all the time, which is great to have this for. I may invest in this, and ask my partner to as well.

Let me know what you think! I'm interested to hear other users' opinions about the apps.

I used the apps side-by-side again on my ride in this morning, and the results are much more comparable. I'll post another update when I have something conclusive to report, but here's what I've taken away after a couple days worth of use:

I would definitely keep in mind that it does drain some battery. In using both apps simultaneously on a 14.4 mile ride to work this morning, my battery went from 100% to 92%. Not a big deal for a commute since I can plug in when i get to my destination, but if you're going out for a long ride you'll want to be aware of this. CrashLight isn't going to do any good if your phone battery is dead. Keep in mind I'm using an almost-two-year-old iPhone 6, and that I'm using both apps at the same time. Battery usage may be almost negligible if only using one of the apps, or if using a newer phone with a better battery. On the other hand, I'm currently using the apps with the screen turned off and the phone in my pocket. If you have the phone mounted on your bars or in a tank bag and are actively using the app while riding, it would surely have a greater impact on battery life.

I'm now almost 100% convinced that there is no way to go through and see the individually recorded data points on FUSAR. It does provide a nice summary, but I'd like to see the source data so I can better determine the accuracy. To that point, ESR allows you to scroll through the individual data points, and I've found that through most turns the app does not record maximum lean angle (but there's no way that I've found to compare this to what FUSAR is recording, except to compare maximum and average figures which it reports). It might catch the lean just as you're starting to turn in or as you're exiting the turn. Sometimes it does catch the max lean angle, but not very often through most of the short, tight turns that I ride daily because I'm not staying leaned over long enough.

More to come...

EDIT: One thing I've noticed about ESR, at least with my phone in my breast pocket per their instructions, is that it doesn't like to calibrate. When scrolling through straight stretches (where the user guide says it should calibrate) it continually shows 8-12 degrees of right lean angle. This is evident in my final results from several rides, where my max right lean angle is approximately 20 degrees higher than my max left lean angle. We'll see if anything changes once i have a bar mount for my phone.

The other thing I'd like to point out is that FUSAR provides weather alerts. They seem helpful if you can see your phone while you're riding. After I stopped at the eye doctor yesterday and was walking back out to the bike, one popped up to let me know that they were predicting showers in the area. The more I use both, the more I'm beginning to prefer FUSAR. One potential detractor for FUSAR is that even though it gives the option to switch between US Standard and Metric, the elevation units are unchanged. It's stuck on meters above sea level, while ESR shows feet above sea level. It doesn't make much of a difference to me, as it's pretty flat in Ohio, but I could see how it could be a bit of an issue for some users.