Can someone tell how to tell whether a particular fabric or style of jersey is likely to cause problems for your HRM? Yesterday morning, I tried a new jersey and was shocked to see my HR red line. After I checked to see if I was still alive I started suspecting a bad battery or that somehow I hadn't adequately moistened the sensors or adjusted the position of the strap. So , on my afternoon ride, I was really careful about those issues and in spite of my care as soon as my HR went up above about 120 the HRM just kept going up to ridiculous values. I had a spare shirt in my bag so I decided to switch shirts without doing anything else. I had no further problems, but I am bummed that I can't use my new jersey with my HRM.

So how do I tell what jerseys are OK. The manual suggests sticking to cotton or wetting the fabric, but I notice almost all the things I see sold are made of polyester, which I suspect is what my new jersey is made of.

Dancer

Can someone tell how to tell whether a particular fabric or style of jersey is likely to cause problems for your HRM? Yesterday morning, I tried a new jersey and was shocked to see my HR red line. After I checked to see if I was still alive I started suspecting a bad battery or that somehow I hadn't adequately moistened the sensors or adjusted the position of the strap. So , on my afternoon ride, I was really careful about those issues and in spite of my care as soon as my HR went up above about 120 the HRM just kept going up to ridiculous values. I had a spare shirt in my bag so I decided to switch shirts without doing anything else. I had no further problems, but I am bummed that I can't use my new jersey with my HRM.

So how do I tell what jerseys are OK. The manual suggests sticking to cotton or wetting the fabric, but I notice almost all the things I see sold are made of polyester, which I suspect is what my new jersey is made of.

Dancer

The only times I have ever had problems with an HRM getting false readings were a direct result of wearing a jersey that fit me somewhat loose across the chest, and then the jersey flapping in the wind. Sometimes re-wetting the chest strap will help. I can only guess that the flapping material either creates a false signal or modifies the signal being emitted from the chest strap. Sometimes my readings would be 220 bpm and other times they would be 0 bpm.

Normally this isn't a problem for me because I live in a very temperate climate and I usually wear a thin poly-pro sleeveless undershirt on all but the warmest days. The undershirt definitely takes care of the problem.

The undershirt definitely takes care of the problem.

sage advice. a base layer should be worn almost all of the time.

i wear one 365 (well, not really 365, but on every ride i do if truth be told ;)).

Thanks much for the suggestion. It worked like a charm.

I think I am going to have a piece of cotton sewn onto the inside of my jerseys and see if that will work too.

Dancer

sage advice. a base layer should be worn almost all of the time.

i wear one 365 (well, not really 365, but on every ride i do if truth be told ;)).