TL;DR
- One Redditor turned his Galaxy Watch 4 into a custom motorcycle sat nav.
- The project uses a 3D printed shell to house the Watch 4 and its charger.
- While it looks great, some software issues still need to be ironed out.
If you are not always a smartphone user replace your old phone you have probably thought many times what to do with an old phone to buy a new one on credit. Maybe it’s being passed down to a younger family member or kept as a backup, but it also has a lot of great features. DIY projects you can do with old equipmentlike changing it as a security camera. But what about wearable devices? We just checked out how one smartwatch user modified an old model stylish transmission for their carand today we have another vehicle related smartwatch project to share.
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It can have wide panels, perfect for large, screen-based systems like cars Android Autohowever, this situation could not be more different when it comes to motorcycles. If you’ve got nothing more than a speedometer and a couch, you’re often out of luck, and adding aftermarket screens can involve some very awkward bolt-on attachments to crowded handlebars. In Reddit’s Galaxy Watch subsection, however, the user someone427 a Galaxy Watch 4 adding a mini sat nav screen to their bikes.
On the hardware side, we’re not really looking at much here: just a few 3D printed cases to add some protection and stability. To really stick to the bike, someone427 says they use the magnetic base of the charger itself, which you can see at the beginning of the video.
Having a charger in there is essential to keep the Galaxy Watch’s screen on, making sure it doesn’t die until the end of your trip. But even with that sorted, there seem to be a few issues with this build, such as an unexpected lag that breaks the Watch 4’s map display from syncing with a connected phone. There are also problems with auto-rotation, which causes the image on the screen to rotate at inappropriate times.
Hopefully someone can solve some of these remaining headaches (readers have already chimed in with their suggestions) and make this thing really stable, because it’s a neat idea that looks pretty cool on this bike – and we imagine it’ll look just as cool on many others. The unobtrusive size and rounded shape feel perfect to match the aesthetics of many motorcycle instrument clusters.
Once you’re done wearing a smartwatch as a wristwatch, what else can you think about using it for? Share your thoughts in the comments.
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