Stages power meter repair help

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onemanpeloton
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Location: Edinburgh, UK

by onemanpeloton

Hi guys

Picking your brains here because my gen 1 stages 9000 crank arm is out of warranty and stages only want to sell me a new one.

Basically the power meter over reads power massively. Apparently my 40 min commute has avr power of 1000w and max of 2000w. This should be closer to 200 and 1000 most days.

The stages unit has a small crack in it which i assume has let some water in. Normally i would write it off in this situation but the power readings are consistent albeit wrong.

Any suggestions? Thanks
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bikeboy1tr
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by bikeboy1tr

I assume you have been doing the Stages updates whenever they come out. If I get caught in the rain I usually remove the arm and pull the battery and then store it in a bag of rice. I know with mine if I get it wet it eats batteries up at an alarming rate.
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bilwit
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by bilwit

onemanpeloton wrote:
Mon Nov 05, 2018 11:11 pm
The stages unit has a small crack in it which i assume has let some water in.
sounds toast to me. If the readings are consistent as you say, doesn't the phone app let you specify a manual offset?

NiFTY
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by NiFTY

It sounds cooked.
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alcatraz
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by alcatraz

Doesn't sound good. Did you redo the calibration in your stages app and garmin to be sure?

To keep moisture away you need to put a piece of plastic over the whole power meter and then wrap electrical tape over it all. Change the battery before you do.

/a

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FIJIGabe
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by FIJIGabe

I sent one back, recently, and they replaced the PM on my crank arm for $200, and now I have a warranty on that unit. Just a thought.

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onemanpeloton
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by onemanpeloton

thanks for all the replies.

I admit it doesnt look hopeful but I still thought that, given its consistency, it might be salvageable.

I've updated the firmware and done a zero offset a few times, nothing changes.

im in the UK. I contacted stages who put me in touch with the UK distributor and they said they wouldnt replace the PM on my crank even if I paid for it. Shame really.
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FIJIGabe
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by FIJIGabe

That sucks. Sorry to hear that the local distributor would do that. You don't happen to have any relatives in the US, do you?

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onemanpeloton
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by onemanpeloton

sadly not! it's a shame that the distributor wont help, given that stages offer this service.

may I ask how much you paid to have yours fixed? if its cheap enough then maybe i can find a US friend!
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FIJIGabe
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by FIJIGabe

It was $200 for the repair, plus shipping to them (they covered ground shipping back to me).

2lo8
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by 2lo8

onemanpeloton wrote:
Mon Nov 05, 2018 11:11 pm
Picking your brains here because my gen 1 stages 9000 crank arm is out of warranty and stages only want to sell me a new one.
That seems about right for Stages customer service. Even when it came to known design flaws on the gen 1s, they would claim there was nothing wrong with the design because it lasted the life of the product, meaning the duration of the warranty period.
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onemanpeloton
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by onemanpeloton

For anyone else looking for a fix, I managed to get it fixed! Many thanks to user alanmclean

When I went in to the tools page in the android stages app, my crank length was listed as 862. Turns out this number was what was causing the massive power readings.

Here's how to fix it:

You need to connect to the crank with Stages app on an Android phone.
Then <Tools page. (I presume you can see your crank length is wrong on this page)
Then swipe left to right four times and you should be able select correct crack length from a drop down menu at bottom of page
You'll need to ensure firmware is up to date.
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FIJIGabe
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by FIJIGabe

Thanks for posting the answer. I'm surprised that this fix is only available on Android, and not on iOS.

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