Logging Floors - a comparrison

[ratman_42]

So, anymore I guess that posting here is akin to trolling since I will not be using anything "Fit Bit" in the future.  But, I figured this would be interesting. 

I have posted before about the poor job the fitbit does logging floors.  But, in the interest of science I decided to do some testing.  

First, some background.  We are in the habit of providing patients with cheap fitness trackers to help prove to insurance companies that they are indeed using their prosthesis.  And, since we don't get paid for providing these we use the cheapest we can find. 

Recently we have been using a super cheap tracker that I think can be bought on Walmart's web sight.  It's fifteen bucks shipped.  I noticed the other day that it logged elevation change so I thought I'd put it to the test.  First I walked up and down the first flight of the staircase at the hospital (seven feet of elevation change) 20 times with the fit-bit on.  Total floors logged ZERO.  Then I repeated this test with the fifteen dollar unit.  Total floors logged ELEVEN.  obviously this isn't perfect but, it still was able to register the "half floors" and add them together for a more accurate total.  

As a second test I walked all the way up to the first floor (12 feet of elevation change) 20 times with each device.  The fitbit ONLY logged ELEVEN floors - the cheap tracker logged 22.  

So.. .       . In conclusion.  The super cheap unit did a fairly accurate job of tracking elevation change and the fitbit didn't even come close.  

Now, to be fair, the cheap unit will short out if you shower or even sweat heavily but, Still ..  .          .

[MakMak]

Hi, @ratman_42! Interesting experiment. Fortunately or unfortunately, Fitbit has chosen 10 feet of elevation change (roughly the height change of a normal floor in a building) as their elevation change for a flight. So, your Fitbit is behaving more or less as expected. I have also noticed that if I walk up and down flights a few times to hit my flight goal it doesn't work very well. I think maybe the altimeter doesn't reset the pressure change very well when it's repeating like that. Just my observations.