Suunto Vertical Ascent and descent very incorrect and are not agreeing with other devices - using Suunto Baro 9

[AndyG]

Re: Suunto vertical ascent/ descent totally incorrect

What are the actions to take to get these cumulative ascent / descend totals in line?

Baro 9 is one year old. I do wear it at work and work as landscaper - cutting stone and other materials, there is plenty of dust / rock etc - does this clog the sensor and make the tracking inaccurate?

In the Winter when the watch is covered the cumulative ascent / descent seems correct (sleeves covering watch).

It is hot here now and I am doing a lot of mountain biking - generally no sleeves to cover the sensor or the watch.

I have noticed that the starting elevation, the top elevation, distance, time and heart rate are within reason close to a Garmin device my friend uses.

I also see that when exporting the KML from the Suunto app and importing it into Google Earth and viewing elevation profile - it looks “correct” and the cumulative ascent / descent is also more believable.

The one set of numbers that are completely wrong and not believable are the cumulative ascent / descent that are displayed in the Suunto app on my iPhone.

I have screen shots that show all the issues - yesterdays ride:

starting el, high point, distance and time similar
total Ascent:
Garmin 495m,
KML in Google earth (from Baro 9) 710m
Suunto iPhone app 2,478m.

Any help appreciated.

[Brad_Olwin]

@AndyG What does the watch display for elevation gain/loss? Same as phone? It is possible the sensor has an issue a FAQ below
https://forum.suunto.com/topic/9960/more-faq?_=1719606955631

[AndyG]

@Brad_Olwin said in Suunto Vertical Ascent and descent very incorrect and are not agreeing with other devices - using Suunto Baro 9:

https://forum.suunto.com/topic/9960/more-faq?_=1719606955631

Hi brad, thanks for the reply.

Unfortunately - the watch is displaying similar ascent / descent totals to the Suunto App.

I have over the last two days performed a soft reset, and then a hard reset - and I am using the built in mountain biking “trail” exercise modes.

This morning I went out for a ride and similar issues resulted on a freshly hard reset watch. I also calibrated the altitude in the watch with the known altitude of my starting point.

KML exported to Google earth
start el. 485m
top elevation 671m
total ascent 544m

Suunto app and logbook in watch
start elevation 480m
top elev 678m
total ascent 1,901m

Again - raw elevations are close enough to not worry.
Calculation of ascent is totally out - not acceptable for someone working professionally with this watch. My winter time job is ski patrol / avalanche forecaster.

How do I move towards getting this watch checked out / fixed?

Thanks,

Andy

[AndyG]

@Brad_Olwin

Thanks for the link -

“Q6: My watch measures a lot more vertical gain than I actually did. What to do?
A6: If your watch has a barometric sensor, then it can be fooled by a couple of reasons. As it reads the air pressure very sensitively, it can be influenced by:
clothing pressing against the sensor or jackets periodically building up air pressure inside during movement.
Water or snow or dirt in the openings of the watch housing.
High winds when the watch is worn above clothing.
You want to make sure that all the above factors can be avoided to ensure an accurate vertical gain measurement.”:

This does make some sense but again - the raw elevations that the watch picks up are not excessively out.

If the gps track was really out - then exporting the KML and importing to google earth would show a similar skewed track.

This doesn’t occur so I can assume that the raw track that the S9B is making is more or less accurate but that the calculation that the S9B is making for ascent / descent is faulty.

Sure it could be the sensor - but if it were the sensor then I would expect the raw elevations to be off. It seems to be an issue with the software in the S9B.

Mine is updated to the latest version 2.26.8

Thanks

[Egika]

@AndyG the clue most likely does not lie in the low and high point of the activity, but in what happens in between.
Your watch seems to register a lot of small up and downs, that it all sums up to a total climb that is too high.
Like if you have an undulating terrain.
If you don’t have this kind of terrain, then the watch is making it up.

The FAQ section is there for you to check where the variations might come from.
Have you gone trough the list and possibly found one of the mentioned root causes to be your case?

[maszop]

@AndyG The total number of climbs in windy weather is absolutely absurd in Suunto watches. The newer it is, the worse it is.
Probably the price for better accuracy in given places.