Garmin Edge Explore 2 is brilliant for distance cycling – External power mount pin outs

The Wahoo I had inherited died on my recent trip to Turkey, the Bluetooth connection failed completely and the battery life started to die along with the USB port connection. My old Garmin 1000 had a button fall off and was called into reserve duty and just made it before it’s USB connection failed too. USB is just a crap idea for a rugged outdoor device, but getting a replacement device means dealing with this again.

But wait, there is an alternative the new super duper Garmins out mean the Edge 1030 are being discounted and have the power connect pins at the rear. I like Garmins for their use of waypoints and customisation options but still was undecided compared to a last gen Wahoo Roam which were also being discounted.

Then I noticed the Garmin Edge Explore 2 power bundle. This also had the rear power connector pins, updated faster chip speed and rumours of a very good battery life. This could be my dream device especially as downloading routes to and from Garmin Connect on your phone is vastly improved now. SOLD I bought one.

This is the power mount which is actually a bit more than just a few pins connected to the wires. It comes ready to plug into the Cannondale E-bike system via a very slimline plug, I got the add on Shimano style cable which gives you a nice long cable and bare wires to connect as you feel. I fitted a USB-A plug so I could tuck away a 5V battery pack in a waterproof place in the bike bags. The mid cable connector is super waterproof, O-Ring sealed. There is an exploded diagram of the power mount in the manual HERE, and yes it does come with a cover to save the pins from the rain while camping overnight. You could just chop off the connector its sold with, and hope the colours used are the same as the extender cable.

As can be seen from the cable Info, the mount has a small embedded LED in its front. This is a handy status guide as it glows solid green to show the power is connected before the Garmin is mounted, very useful for cable and power pack status. When the Garmin is mounted the LED flashes green, so far I’ve not seen it Red. The LED draws no measurable current, its negligible.

As for the pin out and power connections, this is all I can tell you, or find out, Trying to meter between the cable wires and the pins tells you nothing, the circuitry built into the mount gets in the way. The polarity of the power is not important for the reason that the Garmin can be mounted 180 degs either way, up or down so the connections allow for this. Making your own power mount is possible, and their are printable patterns for this . You can find DIY Info here https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4806657 and printable files here https://www.printables.com/model/136674-garmin-5308301030-usb-mount

The connection to the Garmin via the power mount pins seems to restrict the current taken to 0.5A, which is only a problem if you are trying to charge it quickly, say if you make a mobile charging dock. In normal use it is designed to keep the Garmin at full charge in use; leave the battery pack connected and forget about it. It works brilliantly and combined with the fact that I load all routes to the device by Bluetooth and download all rides to Strava; both by Garmin connect, I have NEVER used the USB connection, that should make it last a lot longer then. (now USB-C)

Power up view

I like the new Interface, initially on power up, which is very fast, you can jump to rides, courses and navigation easily from the screen. Your last loaded course is shown for quick access and the list of courses has a handy descriptive map if your naming is vague. One retained feature I love on the Edge series is that you can still colour multiple courses to show permanently on the screen without following them turn by turn. And yippee, the virtual partner has gone, good riddance. There are so many features I like about this unit. Riding along you just touch the screen for 2 seconds and a pop up view showing current time, temperature and battery power appear, that’s three data windows you don’t need to add to a screen right there, they fade away after 5 seconds.

This pop up display also shows an expected run time from the battery available, fully charged it states 38 hrs. From tests I did from a weeks worth of riding with no charging at all I can believe this (bluetooth off) On a 4 week tour to France I was using an old 1000 mAhr Pebble battery pack to keep the Garmin at 100% It lasted for 4 days riding for 8 hrs each day, as most are 2000 mAhr this is great. I am confident that I might even junk the Dynamo hub in future, when it dies.

Courses view (not mine)

Mid ride stop recording view

At mid ride cafe stops I like to stop the ride recording and put the unit to sleep, then place it in my pocket for security. This uses barely any power in sleep mode and reconnects to the external supply no problem on return. The ride restarts easily (try that on your Wahoo!)

When stopped the progress along your current route is shown as above, with distance remaining clearly indicated. The big pause navigation button appears any time when you go off route which allows you to divert with or without re-routing. the navigation resumes when you get back on route if you pause it. Again good control.

At the end of a ride because I have the Bluetooth switched off its a a simple action of swiping down from the top of the screen, selecting phone and switching it on. Rides upload to Garmin connect and onward to Strava or other sites no problem. Leaving the phone connected at all times still dosent use much more power, but I have no need for phone messages mid ride, or the nifty weather reports.

Garmin decided not to add WiFi to this device which is not a problem in use. Loading data to, and courses from Garmin Connect has not proved to be slow in remote use.

Somewhere along the Seine in France

Another point is that I have found the screen to be perfect in sunlight, running it with no brightness has been perfect for most use, and its easy to brighten it up when required. No rain problems which is a vast improvement. One niggle I’ve found with the screen is that the enlarge and reduce map buttons on the screen are tiny , but a way around that is to press the hand button instead and then quickly pinch and move to change the view, nice.

How do I load routes with my favorite Cue points ( you can add Waypoints as well but there is still the overall limit of 200 of these for long tours with many files)

I can still add waypoints from the screen during a ride, which I often do to mark cafe locations or great wild camp spots for future reference.

For route loading I use two methods depending on which suits my needs best at the time, both can be done from your phone at any time. Firstly If you use RideWithGPS to create a route, add as many cue points as you like then PIN the ride as a favourite. This will then auto load to Garmin connect as a TCX file with the cues added. (after you set this option once) and will be sent to the Garmin automatically when you next sync to your phone.

A cue point added for Saumur in Cycle Travel

In the field I am using the excellent Cycle Travel route planner to create safe cycling routes. Its really worth getting to know this site as you can save created routes directly to Garmin connect with a one click selection. The designer is an avid cyclist and he added Cue points at my request and they work very well. to add a cue point you just add a Via point on the route, click it and use the Write Note function to add the text (no symbols available) Again no limit to how many.

Perhaps it’s worth a full post on how I use Cycle Travel to plan a route, add cue points and overnight stops and quickly check for campsites or other accommodation. Leave a comment if this would be useful, that is of course if anyone even reads this 😉