ArenaGear Sports Timers

Q: Does the timer need WiFi or cellular service to work?

A: It does not, it only needs a phone or tablet with Smart Bluetooth (all Apple devices and most Android phones and tablets)

Q: Can I use the RM-110 or RM-501 to measure the time between the start line and the finish line?

A: No, only the RM-510 can have different start and finish lines, they can be as far as 800 meters apart and you can add intermediate gates to measure split times

Q: How does ArenaGear RM-510 compare to Dashr for football / Track&Field?

A: Some of the most important differences are:
Accuracy - ArenaGear RM-510 is 10 times more accurate, measuring to 1/1,000th of a second. We employ custom high power radios to link the start and finish gates and only use Bluetooth to broadcast the results to smartphones in the vicinity. With the ArenaGear system, all the phones get the exact same time results. Dashr displays times to 1/100 of a second, but because it relies on the phone’s Bluetooth radios for timing, the time accuracy could be much lower than that —- different phones could get different times for the same run.

Range - ArenaGear's more powerful radios allow the finish gate to be up to 800 yards (2,400 feet or about 1/2 mile) away from the start gate and still get measurements accurate to 1/1,000th of a second. According to reviews, Dashr has trouble connecting to the finish gate if more than 40 yards away.

Safety - ArenaGear uses an eye-safe IR beam and uses no dangerous lasers or reflectors. On the 5-10-5 drill, the athlete’s face is very close to the laser (or the reflector) and therefore eye-safety is a huge concern for schools and trainer facilities. Dashr uses Class 3B lasers which can cause permanent eye damage.

Versatile - Stagger Start mode allows up to 32 runners on the track at the same time, which is great for testing everyone in a large class on the longer runs such as 100 and 400 meters. Dashr can only measure one athlete at a time.

Display - ArenaGear’s product lineup includes a large display board for public events to display event times. Use our customizable colors to display times in seven different colors. Checkout the Accessories page for information and pricing for the ArenaGear display.

Q: How does ArenaGear RM-510 compare to Freelap?

A: Some of the most important differences are:

Accuracy - ArenaGear RM-510 is 20 times more accurate, measuring to 1/1,000th of a second (0.001). Freelap claims to be accurate to 2/100th of a second (0.02) (https://www.freelapusa.com/faq)

ArenaGear uses a straight infrared light beam that is about 1/4 of an inch in diameter and is exactly lined up with the start or finish lines, there is no question of where the athlete is when the beam is broken. Freelap uses a “proximity detector” that senses when the chip worn by the athlete is somewhere close by. The Freelap detection area is a big sphere about 4 feet in diameter. The chip could be detected anywhere within this sphere, with no correlation with the start or finish lines. This could introduce a big error at both ends of a run: The time won’t start until you leave the sphere at the start and it stops as soon as you get close to the sphere at the finish, giving you a shorter time than it took to make the run.

ArenaGear does not require expensive doohickeys for each athlete, time starts and stops when the beams are broken. ArenaGear is a much more accurate and cost-effective solution.

ArenaGear does not need a “Relay Coach”, times are calculated by the pod at the start line and broadcasted to as many phones or iPads as you want.

Q: Sometimes I see a slight delay between the horse crossing the laser and the time on my phone start to roll, is this normal?

A: Yes it is, here is an explanation from our engineering department:

In order to offer a price competitive solution without sacrificing precision, we decided to use Bluetooth to send the times to phones for the display of the time. Not having a separate display controller allows us to offer a professional-grade system for a fraction of the price of the competition. However, the use of Bluetooth has the drawback that different phones take different amounts of time to process the Bluetooth radio packet. Sometimes the phone is busy doing something else (like checking for email) and misses the start packet altogether, that's why the phones are used strictly to display time and are in no way involved in the calculation of the final run time (unlike most other systems that work with a phone). Some Android phones seem to be worse than others, while newer iPhones and iPads are the most responsive. Our display board responds almost instantaneously.

This is how it works: the first time the horse/runner breaks the beam, a Bluetooth packet is broadcast to tell the phones to start displaying a rolling time, sometimes the phone misses the first radio packet but catches a later packet so the time appears to have started late but, again, the phone is just a display. When the horse/runner crosses the laser the second time, the laserhead (the unit on the tripod) internally calculates the time difference from its own measurements and continuously broadcasts the final time. At that point, the phones stop displaying the rolling clock (and discard the numbers on the display) and show the final time received from the laserhead.

The competition also uses Bluetooth but the times are calculated on the phone instead of on the laserhead. Bluetooth packets have an inherent +/-20ms jitter and, because the time calculations are based on the time the packets are received at the phone, the run time calculated may be off by as much as 40ms (0.040 seconds). Additionally, if the phone misses receiving the one packet from the finish line, the run won’t be measured. This is a huge problem as Bluetooth has a maximum range of about 30 yards (about 100 feet) and the phone needs to be connected to both start and finish gates at the same time.

I understand that it can be confusing to see the display on the phone not starting right away, but be assured that this delay is due to the phone internals -- and because in the ArenaGear system the phone is not involved in the final time calculations, the delay in no way affects the final time displayed at the end.

Q: I can’t get my Android phone to connect to the timer

A: Please turn on the Bluetooth on the phone and grant both Bluetooth and location permissions to the app. Some phones require you to turn on location services on the phone and reboot the phone to apply the changes. We don’t use your location at all, but the phones still require you to grant the permission, that’s common for Android and iOS devices.

Some Android phones have a bug on the Bluetooth stack that makes them very slow to connect to the gate, if your phone has issues resetting the time we suggest looking for a used iPad or a cheap Android phone (you don’t need a data or voice plan so a supermarket phone will work fine)

Q: How do I setup a multi-lane system? 

A: Here are a few instructions on setting up a side-by-side dual system:

1- turn on both Start gates and wait at least 1 minute before turning on the other gates. When you turn ON the Start gates they try to pair to any nearby G or F gates. You don't want an accidental pairing of a gate from one lane to the Start of the other lane so waiting a minute avoids that.

2- Setup the Start gates about hip height, and put the black box in the inside of the two lanes pointing to the outside, and the S gray gates on the outside pointing to the inside, that way the laser from one lane won't hit the receiver of the opposite lane

3- Turn on the other gates, wait for the yellow light to slow down to one quick flash every 3 seconds, and verify that it flashes at the same time as the S gate of the same lane. If it flashes at the wrong time then you had an accidental pairing with the other lane and you need to do a new pairing procedure to fix that. After you confirm the lights are synchronized you can deploy that gate to its final location, also hip height and the gray on the outside.

4- you need a dedicated phone or iPad for each lane, keep it close to the S gate and don't move it around. The phone will get data from the closest gate, if you move the phone it may get data from the other lane and show you the wrong split or finish times. If for some reason the phone is showing you weird splits, you can hit the trashcan icon (on an iPhone/iPad) to erase the list of times and refresh the data from just the last run. The gates continually broadcast the results until you reset the time or start a new run, so the phone will get a fresh copy of the data. If you have an Android you need to kill the app in order to refresh the data.

If you have only one phone, you can stand very close to the S gate of one lane, delete the list of times and get the data from the lane you are standing by. You can then move to the other lane and repeat the procedure

If you are using an Android phone, we just uploaded a new version of the app (version 6.00), On Android you can see a dark band on the top of the screen that lets you choose which timer the phone is connected to.

If you are getting random split times when no one is breaking the beam, try pointing the black box a bit better. If you are missing crossings, the ice may be causing reflections so point the black box a bit higher to keep the beam off the ice. On ice we recommend the beams are set to hip height or higher

Q: With Free lap you have to set the finish cone 80cm beyond the finish for any semblance or accuracy, does this system have that problem?

A: No, our gates use laser beams for extreme accuracy. You set the finish gate at the finish line. Times start and finish when the laser is cut by the athlete

Q: Your price is only a fraction of other pro wireless timing systems, are you using cheap or less accurate components?

A: Our founder and Chief Engineer spent many years designing and building ultra-reliable laser missile guidance systems for the US DoD, he is also an expert on factory processes and automation. He designed the devices and our factory to the highest degree of efficiency and quality possible. We can make the devices for less while utilizing the best materials available, and we pass on the saving to you.

Back in the 70’s a cell phone cost upwards of $10K, now a better phone is available for under $20 at the supermarket. The same advances in technology and fabrication that made that possible are also what allows ArenaGear to offer a better system for less.