hurtmypony

I haven't experienced any flaky connections with mine, and that's with the speaker near the headset and the phone in my front pocket, coat pocket, Carradice saddle bag (buried in there, too) or top tube bag. Maybe I got lucky or you got unlucky with the quality of the thing. The only time I've ever had it drop connection is a couple of rare times when the terrain changed unexpectedly for the worse and the speaker got jarred/jolted a bit.

PatrickGSR94

Well you keep it within line of sight of the speaker aside from thin material. If the speaker is in front of my body and the phone behind (jersey pocket), it won't work hardly at all.

hurtmypony

Well, not to be contentious, and I'll admit I have rarely tested it this way, but when it rains, I bury my phone in the Carradice bag under all the Fredly junk I carry in it to further protect it from potential leaks/exposure.

In that case, the signal pairing must past through all of that and my seat stem/legs, through the top tube bag and to the stem, and it did so with no issue the 6 or 7 times I traveled that way (generally no more than an hour per outing).

I'll try mine in the rear compartment of my jacket [duck pouch, is it called?] which is similarly positioned to a jersey pocket once I get my bike back from the mechanic, if only to confirm mine will suffer the same issue you are having.

cyclist2000

I have read that bluetooth doesn't work well when the body is between the transmitter and the receiver.

This is from the Wahoo Fitness site,

"The biggest problem with connection issues is that the human body is primarily water and water is a perfect insulator to 2.4GHz radio traffic. If your phone is flat against your back in a center jersey pocket it is very difficult for the signals to make it to the RFLKT+. If you place your phone in a side pocket with some space between your phone and skin the signals can find there way to the RFLKT+ much more reliably. Unless the phone is in direct line of sight with the RFLKT+, the signals will have to bounce off surrounding objects like the ground or nearby trees. As a last resort, placing your phone under the saddle in a saddle bag will provide a line of sight to the RFLKT+ and subsequently a much much better connection."

My solution is to have the mount the phone on the handlebars or have one of those bags that fits on top of the top tube, and my phone is handy.

cyclist2000

I use a Outdoor buckshot and I find that on windy days that I cannot hear it all. I also use a Polk boombit that mount to my jersey collar but the battery only lasts about an hour.

Vortac180

I think I'm as safe with my earbuds as without. Maybe safer: when commuting I startle easily, and the idiotic teens (and others), find it funny to try to startle a bicyclist--partly because bicycle commuting is somewhat of an unusual sight around here. They honk behind me or drive up and yell. Without sound deadening earbuds, I startle and jump. This has nearly caused me to crash several times. With my old Sony Walkman and new ear buds that seal into the ear canals giving passive noise cancelling, I still hear cars, horns and yelling, but it's not loud enough to make me jump. I can can ignore them, yet I know they are there. The only down side I've experienced is on those rare occasions when another bicyclist is overtaking me (there are not that many bicyclists around here) unless they call out, I won't hear them.

Mister214

Between cars, pedestrians and kids looking to rob people on bikes...
No.