When will power meters be affordable to the masses?

[wemorgan]

I like the idea of a power meter to structure my training, but £1000 seems too much to me.
So does anyone have a crystal ball care to say when they'll be nearer to £250?
ie. do I bite the bullet soon and buy one knowing they'll always be a premium price, or wait a few years for the price to tumble?

Decisions, decisions.

Whilst on the topic how accurate is Strava estimated average power?

Thanks.

[Magic919]

Can't see them getting that low for crank-based ones. The crank for the Quarq is about £300 I expect. I'm not expecting any big drops soon without some new technology.

[Mr Ted]

The components used are mature technology so there is unlikely to be any significant drop in manufacturing cost in the future, to get a significant price drop there would either have to be a large increase in numbers built (economy of scale) or a change in the distribution chain i.e., if you could buy direct from the manufacturer.

[okgo]

They're about £500-600 quid already, have you not looked recently at power 2 max and quarq?

They both recently dropped their prices significantly, they've never been more affordable than they are now.

[anonymous-user]

keep an eye on eBay

[wemorgan]

Cheers for the replies.
I know my left knee is weaker than my right, so all kits I'm interested are dual sided.
As for the price reduction, I was thinking more economies of scales. Just look how cheap GPS watches are now verses 15 years ago.
My bike is a modest £800, so spending the same again on a power meter feels imbalanced.
It's all about personal priorities I guess.

[ALawson]

okgo said:

They're about £500-600 quid already, have you not looked recently at power 2 max and quarq?

They both recently dropped their prices significantly, they've never been more affordable than they are now.

What type of BB is the SL4 S-Works Tarmac? Have you got power 2 max?

[okgo]

ALawson said:

What type of BB is the SL4 S-Works Tarmac? Have you got power 2 max?

Some god awful pressit BB30 thing, I've got a praxis GXP adatper/bb in there to house my qaurq, got another qaurq on the TT bike too. Great bits of kit.

The p2m and qaurq both measure both legs, if that is what you're interested in.

[ALawson]

okgo said:

Some god awful pressit BB30 thing, I've got a praxis GXP adatper/bb in there to house my qaurq, got another qaurq on the TT bike too. Great bits of kit.

The p2m and qaurq both measure both legs, if that is what you're interested in.

Just been on both those website, looks like keeping my 4 hole Ultegra chain rings won't be easy. I like the idea of power but a single sided Stages seems price saving too far. I can get the Garmin vectors new for £850, just seeing what crank arm based solution would cost.

do I need it, no way....!

[okgo]

Power 2 max with rings etc less than £600 at the minute I think. FAR better proposition than stages or vectors IMO.

[mft]

http://www.dcrainmaker.com/2014/09/4iiiis-introduc...

[neenaw]

wemorgan said:

Whilst on the topic how accurate is Strava estimated average power?

Not even remotely accurate!

[JEA1K]

neenaw said:

Not even remotely accurate!

There's no way of it being remotely accurate ... I don't know why they don't remove the feature when you don't use a powermeter.

Here's my extended data from a ride last night based on Strava's guesswork ... its of no use whatsoever.

Zone from w to w time % in zone
Z1 0.0 50.0 00:19:47 15.9%
Z2 50.0 100.0 00:08:14 6.6%
Z3 100.0 150.0 00:12:26 10.0%
Z4 150.0 200.0 00:15:23 12.4%
Z5 200.0 250.0 00:14:32 11.7%
Z6 250.0 300.0 00:15:25 12.4%
Z7 300.0 350.0 00:12:19 9.9%
Z8 350.0 400.0 00:08:18 6.7%
Z9 400.0 450.0 00:05:45 4.6%
Z10 450.0 500.0 00:03:56 3.2%
Z11 500.0 550.0 00:02:57 2.4%
Z12 550.0 600.0 00:02:06 1.7%
Z13 600.0 700.0 00:01:52 1.5%
Z14 700.0 1100.0 00:01:22 1.1%

[weedram]

This is currently in development and they hope to begin shipping at the end of this year.

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/limits-the-worl...

[Fourmotion]

weedram said:

This is currently in development and they hope to begin shipping at the end of this year.

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/limits-the-worl...

I remember seeing that earlier this year. I was interested until I saw that it moves your pedals wider apart.

When small changes can make a big difference to your comfort on a bike, I didn't think it was worth the risk.

[ALawson]

Why can't they figure out a way of replacing the axle on a pedal and then installing the unit from the inside face of the cranks. That would eliminate the pedal offset.

[Ponk]

Fourmotion said:

weedram said:

This is currently in development and they hope to begin shipping at the end of this year.

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/limits-the-worl...

I remember seeing that earlier this year. I was interested until I saw that it moves your pedals wider apart.

When small changes can make a big difference to your comfort on a bike, I didn't think it was worth the risk.

I'd be very wary of Limits. The last review I read suggested they hadn't even got to a working prototype stage despite the crowd funding.

As ever DC Rainmaker is your guy for power. http://www.dcrainmaker.com/2015/04/limits-power-me...

[bigandclever]

DC Rainmaker does (kind of) like the PowerPod on KickStarter

$249 now. I know nothing of these things

[wemorgan]

Prices do seem to be coming down. 799 Euros for dual sided kit:

http://the5krunner.com/2015/09/30/favero-bepro-ped...

[ALawson]

wemorgan said:

Prices do seem to be coming down. 799 Euros for dual sided kit:

http://the5krunner.com/2015/09/30/favero-bepro-ped...

Don't these pedals effectively move the pedal outboard of where it normally is as the PM is between the crank and the pedal body.