Garmin Approach R10 Portable Golf Launch Monitor

[games]

As a MEVO+ user, I'm following the R10 and Bushnell/Foresight products with interest. 

 

Not because I'm going to defect.  But, the competition brings the possibility of Flightscope unlocking the club face and path tracking on the MEVO+ that much closer to reality!

 

 

 

 

 

 

[glfr9412]

I’m excited for comparison videos to start coming especially with the Mevo+. I coach a small school college golf team in the Midwest and we were about to pull the trigger on a couple of Mevo+ but decided to wait when the R10 was announced.

 

One thing that I was really worried about with the Mevo+ was how finicky indoor setup is, especially the known interference issues. If the R10 is in the same league with Mevo+ performance-wise and has a more user-friendly setup then it’s almost a no-brainer with the price tag.

[jimmies78]

3 hours ago, BrewingSim said:

 

There's a guy in the UK that already has one and has posted youtube videos

I have mine too ( UK )....my net is not here yet though !

[whumber]

My PlayBetter order just shipped. I ordered on 7/7 around 11am EST for reference.

[jagmanjoe]

My PlayBetter order just shipped.   My order was a little after 12 noon EST on 7/7.

[Wildest1]

1 hour ago, whumber said:

My PlayBetter order just shipped. I ordered on 7/7 around 11am EST for reference.

 

53 minutes ago, jagmanjoe said:

My PlayBetter order just shipped.   My order was a little after 12 noon EST on 7/7.

 

Looks like PlayBetter.com is shipping out all their July 7th orders. Their weekly pre-order update from a couple days ago indicated that all their 7/7 orders would go out when the first batch from Garmin arrived.

 

I ordered from Playbetter.com on 7/7 about 5 pm. EST and just got notified: "Shipment information sent to FedEx" with a estimated delivery on Monday. Hopefully a bunch of us will be testing the R10 by the start of next week and a lot of the speculation will be settled. 

 

Edited August 12, 2021 by Wildest1

[misfo]

 

[whumber]

21 minutes ago, misfo said:

 

Discussion by the guy who created the video over on a FB group seems to indicate that this thing is going to be super sensitive to alignment, makes me a little bit worried about usability on outdoor grass ranges where the ground is never truly flat.

Edited August 12, 2021 by whumber

[North Butte]

12 minutes ago, whumber said:

Discussion by the guy who created the video over on a FB group seems to indicate that this thing is going to be super sensitive to alignment, makes me a little bit worried about usability on outdoor grass ranges where the ground is never truly flat.

Even a MEVO (not plus) is super sensitive to position and alignment, in my limited experience. Just a bit of an unlevel surface it's sitting on can lead to some completely implausible launch angle numbers. Move it a few inches to a spot where it settles slightly differently on the grass and the numbers change a lot. 

 

I can only imagine how much moreso that will be for an R10 that's trying to get angles in two dimensions AND for both ball and club. I'd think you'd better have something flat to place it on and be using both a tape measure and a spirit level if you want to believe the path/angle results. 

[Re*Ax]

34 minutes ago, misfo said:

 

So, I scan watched the video, my take away is 

 

a. The R10 seems pretty good

b. I think I know why the person before sold the Gc2&HMT after those first few shots.

 

Seems the path and attack angle are at least fairly consistent to the Gc2 in terms of direction, but the amounts vary - this will do me for what I’m personally trying to achieve/fix.

 

ball speed seems very consistent too, which again helps me 

[whumber]

7 minutes ago, North Butte said:

Even a MEVO (not plus) is super sensitive to position and alignment, in my limited experience. Just a bit of an unlevel surface it's sitting on can lead to some completely implausible launch angle numbers. Move it a few inches to a spot where it settles slightly differently on the grass and the numbers change a lot. 

 

I can only imagine how much moreso that will be for an R10 that's trying to get angles in two dimensions AND for both ball and club. I'd think you'd better have something flat to place it on and be using both a tape measure and a spirit level if you want to believe the path/angle results. 

Yeah, if it's as sensitive as it seems though I'm surprised Garmin wouldn't included some kind of leveling capability in the included stand or maybe an internal gyro and accelerometer to allow for automatic compensation.

Edited August 12, 2021 by whumber

[glfr9412]

32 minutes ago, whumber said:

Discussion by the guy who created the video over on a FB group seems to indicate that this thing is going to be super sensitive to alignment, makes me a little bit worried about usability on outdoor grass ranges where the ground is never truly flat.

What's the Facebook Group called? Or could you link to it?

[Wildest1]

11 minutes ago, whumber said:

Yeah, if it's as sensitive as it seems though I'm surprised Garmin wouldn't included some kind of leveling capability in the included stand or maybe an internal gyro and accelerometer to allow for automatic compensation.

Maybe you can stick a small spirit level (under $6 at Amazon) on top of the R10 with double-sided tape for cheap leveling.

[whumber]

3 minutes ago, Wildest1 said:

Maybe you can stick a small spirit level (under $6 at Amazon) on top of the R10 with double-sided tape for cheap leveling.

I suspect somebody will start selling leveling platforms for these similar to what's been done for the Mevo+.

[Copacetic]

That’s doesn’t look like a levelling issue, the alignment of the r10 to the actual ball looks off, just needs an alignment stick to be putting ball in right spot each time, looks off to right by a few inches each time. 

[whumber]

17 minutes ago, Copacetic said:

That’s doesn’t look like a levelling issue, the alignment of the r10 to the actual ball looks off, just needs an alignment stick to be putting ball in right spot each time, looks off to right by a few inches each time. 

I was thinking more of the AoA issue than the L/R dispersion and spin axis issue. In this case vertical launch seemed spot on though so maybe it's not as big of a problem.

Edited August 12, 2021 by whumber

[jlevatino1122]

You would think a device of this nature would have some form of accelerometer to determine if it’s level. But alignment I could see being challenging. 

[Oh Hi Carl]

Ordered this week through my local shop (east coast USA). Garmin said 4 weeks for delivery. 

[Simpsonia]

1 hour ago, whumber said:

I was thinking more of the AoA issue than the L/R dispersion and spin axis issue. In this case vertical launch seemed spot on though so maybe it's not as big of a problem.

 

The vertical launch did seem to have some issues on some of his shots. I'm guessing the issue for launch and AoA is that the Garmin, like the Mevo+, is very sensitive to its height in relation to the hitting surface. In the video it appears to be on a small piece of turf, but still looked a little lower than the height of the hitting mat the video maker was hitting off of. I wonder if even small height disparities will have an issue on calculation of those parameters. 

[Sandhurst241069]

8 hours ago, tezzlacoil said:

In Australia, one of the larger golf retailers Drummond told me the first batch of preorders would go out mid/late August, 2nd batch in mid September and anyone ordering now would be serviced in early October

Yep Power Golf told me their first batch is expected in the week from 26/8 … I’m apparently good for one of that batch ..

[Sandhurst241069]

8 hours ago, RCGA said:

I'm okay with waiting. I don't really need a LM until mid-fall anyway. 

 

And honestly, that simulator-Mario-Golf mode doesn't look overly interesting, especially if the holes don't really match reality. I don't know what I was expecting - maybe something a little less video game-ish 

Yes I think the Mario Golf is going to be a very brief gateway drug for an E6 subscription..

[Sandhurst241069]

5 hours ago, North Butte said:

I think there has to be some reason the "Big YouTube Guys" haven't posted comparisons. Either they could not get their hands on the R10 or there were problems with the R10 that they didn't want to post about.

 

Those guys typically get early-adopter access to 'most any golf product so my money's on there being issues they're waiting for Garmin to address before posting any comparison videos. 

Yep you have to think so .. Ball measurements seem pretty good and I suspect it’s measured club numbers that are the concern. If that’s something that can be tweaked via firmware releases that’s fine though .. Looking like I’m committed now as my store has looked after me .. don’t want to be stuck with beta hardware when the “all improved all new R20” comes out in 6 mths lol. Perhaps someone with more radar can provide input here..

[mhedwards93]

Call me naive but I can’t see myself getting bored of the 5 free e6 courses too quickly, which I think will be my main source of sim golf. The £90 home tee hero subscription seems good value anyway, but I think 5 courses in a rotation should be plenty….especially in comparison to hitting foam balls into a net! 

[jagmanjoe]

Make your own platform for the R10 easily.  Get an inexpensive cutting board from Walmart HDPE plastic.  Go to Lowes or another source.  The ones I saw at Lowes are Scotch leveling pads a pack of 4 for 3.98 and a small cross check level, another few dollars.  Drill 4 holes in the corners of the cutting board for the leveling pads and insert them and then attach the cross check level in the center of the board.  Then mark the Garmin tripod spots centered on the cutting board and maybe partially drill a small indentation at the three points where they meet the cutting board so you can easily place the unit in the same spot.  You just turn the leveling pads up or down until the unit is level indoors or out.  

 

If you wanted, you could also attach one or two collapsing antennas or similar at each side and extend them out to align the board if you wanted or get really fancy and glue a push button laser at the center to align it, provided the laser is bright enough.

 

If I were moving it around, it is what I would do rather than wait for someone else to mass produce something and charge  about $50 or more.  

[North Butte]

But all of that is what you'd do for setting up an indoors hitting station with a mat and net.

 

Seems to me there would need to be some reasonably simple way to get a workable setup for one session on a driving range. 

 

From my experience with MEVO I'm almost certain none of these units are practical to get real data (i.e. not just ball speed and estimate distance) out on the golf course. Just no practical way to get nearly perfectly alignment and leveling on uneven ground with a portable setup. 

[Red4282]

5 hours ago, misfo said:

 

Wow, that exceeded my expectations. Im sold

[Sandhurst241069]

17 minutes ago, Red4282 said:

Wow, that exceeded my expectations. Im sold

Agree overall that was pretty positive I thought .. I reckon the algorithm will mature over time so spin numbers will improve. Only thing I noticed was ball numbers were very consistent vs the other unit whereas club numbers jumped around a bit .. but I’m a little buoyed for sure..

[ADAbsolutNDN]

 

[Red4282]

12 minutes ago, Sandhurst241069 said:

Agree overall that was pretty positive I thought .. I reckon the algorithm will mature over time so spin numbers will improve. Only thing I noticed was ball numbers were very consistent vs the other unit whereas club numbers jumped around a bit .. but I’m a little buoyed for sure..

Well everyone has different parameters  in the things they are looking for. For me, spin isnt a huge deal. Id just like to practice lowering my dynamic loft and shot shape issues. If im struggling with an overcut, this thing should come in handy in correcting stuff like that.

[mgoblue83]

1 hour ago, Red4282 said:

Wow, that exceeded my expectations. Im sold

 

Agreed and the GC2 is HEAVILY draw biased so I really liked that the R10 was showing less draw spin.