Garmin Edge problems.
 

Hi, I am having a few issues with my Garmin Edge GPS units.
I do a lot of touring so my main needs are turn-by-turn navigation and mapping, speed and distance display, and a record of the route taken.
I have been using a Garmin Edge Explore for several years and it has served me well and met the above needs.

However, 18 months ago I started using a forward-facing action camera (with external battery since it needs to record for 6 to 8 hour rides).
Immediately the recording of routes by the Garmin went haywire with the route profile showing long flat stretches where no speed change was registered like I had ridden into a long tunnel with no GPS signal.
I figured there must have been some interference (maybe bluetooth or WiFi, although these are turned off in the camera), so I stopped carrying the camera and the Garmin went back to normal.
But 6 months later the Garmin stopped registering time in the GPX files recording the rides. I can't find any setting that would turn this off or on, but time displays quite OK on the screen - annoying.

My mate had an old Garmin Edge 20 which he gave me to use to record the routes - I mounted that on the handlebar next to the Explore - same problem as with the camera: but both units failed to record the route correctly - again I assume the two units are interfering with each other.
So I now carry the Edge 20 in my back pocket and use it as a simple GPS logger. The Explore, except for the route recording of time issue, works OK for navigational purposes, but my trust in the unit is now somewhat eroded,

Has anyone else experienced similar symptoms? or have any comments on the issue of interference between units and/or the incorrect route recording.

I have tried factory resets and changed a whole variety of settings to no avail.

First thought is clear your history, everything should have ported to the Connect website so your history is all there, now clean out the unit.

Doesn't the factory reset Adrian99 did clear the history?

I've heard of bluetooth devices and even headlights interfering with Garmins. The simplest test is to remove the camera and see if the normal behavior returns.

If so, reposition either the Garmin or the camera.

Shockingly, no. Any normal person would think so as it doesn't come from the factory with a bunch of not impressive bike ride data that's of no use to anybody except that one cyclist.

I gave my old Garmin watch (Fenix 6X so only one generation old) to a friend this spring. I did a factory reset and did not clear the user data. Initial sync took about an hour for my friend, it turns out this took so long because it added hundreds of my activities to his profile.

​​​​​​It doesn't even make sense to want a gpx activity file without time stamps. Those are necessary for other stuff to work. There's probably no setting for this because it should never be off.

I had a Garmin watch that started doing something it shouldn't which made it unusable. It was long out of warranty but they replaced it. Call them.

So you have a digital record of how much I suck?

They really wouldn’t be proper/correct GPX files without the time stamp (there would be no point for there being a setting to change this). It’s a basic feature.

Anyway, aren’t you getting FIT files? All the Edges (AFAIK) record to FIT files. (Things might be different with other model lines.)

Is it the 1030 Explore?
I see it has "auto sleep" mode, "after 5 minutes of inactivity"--screen and GPS is turned off. But won't any movement keep it awake and recording?

Auto pause can be set to a custom speed, for example, 1.5 mph, to allow the bike to be moved at a stop without recording. It might be set to an unreasonably high speed?

My Edge 1030 records rides as .fit files in the Activities folder. How are you getting .gpx recordings?

I don't see how two Garmins could interfere with each other, so the dual failures must have some external reason for failure.

Other questions:
Do you have a wheel speed sensor linked to it?

Is it set to "1 per second" recording intervals?

An example
Where do you view your rides? Garmin connect, ridewithgps, or what? Can you link one of the failed rides?

Not sure which model you think the OP has. There is no model called the "1030 Explore". They made a 1030, a 1030 Plus, an Explore and now the Explore 2. The OP states he's using then Edge Explore.

A .gpx file that is intended to be a course file is not required to have any timestamp with the route points. There will be a timestamp in the metadata section but it's not required either (I think).

So this does beg the question how the OP is getting the .gpx file and what in fact the .gpx is built to be used as.

Garmin's sporting devices I'm use to typically give .fit files that have to be converted to a human readable format. So how one converts those files and to what they convert them to can make a difference.

Interesting. No. They means either it's different between Edge and Fenix lines, or this had changed and not over a huge span of time.