Alarmingly increasing number of misreads/no reads

[nickm52]

First off, I want to say how much I have enjoyed my Skytrak. It has been a great way to get through the wet northwest winters.

Since the 2.3 update (1.5 firmware update) I have been having a large amount of no reads and times where the indicator goes red after a hit, but ends up not being able to output the shot. This has happened for me in both the Skytrak range and TGC. On Saturday I kept a tally of no reads and I was at 50%. Last night I tried a few different things to help with the no read issue. I only used a 7 iron last night to test last night ( launch angle is 15-16 for me).

My setup:

Garage with 9 ft ceilings
LED Lighting throughout the garage. 1 of the lights is above the hitting mat.
Skytrak is about .75" higher than my mat.
Skytrak is plugged via USB directly into my computer.
Projector is mounted just behind the hitting area.
I am hitting into a golf hitting bay net with an old sheet attached to it that is being used as a makeshift screen for now.

Last night I tried:

unscrewing the light directly above me.
shining a spot light at the ball
putting a backdrop behind me. I have a solid 15 feet between me and the garage doors aside from a support pillar. Reading the lighting thread I thought this might have been the issue.
Moving the ball back 1-4" from the red dot. (this did drop my misreads to ~30%)

Any thoughts on what could be causing this change in performance?

Thanks,

Nick

[Shardak]

First thing I would try is putting the skytrak level with the hitting mat.

Also try using Wifi instead of USB connection if that is an option.

But...since your issue started after a software update, its likely unrelated to the things I mentioned.

[Chughes82]

[Sorry if this is a bit duplicative of Shardak. His post appeared on my computer as I posted this] I'm not sure what could be changing the performance, but I have a guess - with the ST .75" above the mat, perhaps your launch angle of 15-16 degrees is on the edge of the camera field of view. Higher read percentage when moving the ball back from the red dot suggests this. You can check this theory by testing with your 5i and 9i. If the results are worse with the 5i and better with the 9i, ST height may be the cause. Alternatively, you might try lowering the ST to the mat level and re-check your results with the 7i. Good luck!

[nickm52]

I had the unit level on Saturday and tried raising it last night due to comments in the lighting thread. I will lower it tonight. I was also just also thinking that maybe I had a bad update of the unit. I am going to reset the unit back to factory and see if that will help.

Thanks for the replies.

[st_golfer]

I have had a much higher number of no reads and misreads recently as well. Last night was the worst. I had 4 full wedge shots that were read as ground balls by TGC. Could not replicate with the Skytrak range. I just chalked it up to an anomaly. But I had 10 no reads last night on TGC as well. Very odd indeed.

[KJZ78701]

I read somewhere here that ST does not need an external light source, so I tried it. Had just enough indirect lighting to be able to see the ball and all shots registered. I agree with the post about flighting the ball through the center of the "viewing" window. For me, this means wedges are on or in front of the dot and the 3 iron is a couple inches behind the dot. You might also check to see if static electricity has allowed dust to accumulate on the window.

[fiestabuckeye]

I have had the same issue with increase missed shots the last two updates and while lowering it a touch did help, there's still way too many that are missed.

[longhornlove]

Just got home from 2weeks away, fired up TGC and got a 12 on my first hole. Attempted a 12 foot put, addressed it and ball took off without a swing of the putter. Chipped back on the green, attempted and hit a put only to see it shot off the green like I chipped with a 2 iron. Also hit a 193 yard 8 iron from heavy rough 52 yards over the green. WTH is going on.

[Ironstrokes]

Just got home from 2weeks away, fired up TGC and got a 12 on my first hole. Attempted a 12 foot put, addressed it and ball took off without a swing of the putter. Chipped back on the green, attempted and hit a put only to see it shot off the green like I chipped with a 2 iron. Also hit a 193 yard 8 iron from heavy rough 52 yards over the green. WTH is going on.

Sounds like the issue some of us had when TGC first came out. Still don't know how it fixed but after I restarted my computer and just turned the skytrak on and off it started working again normally. I think protee said if you re-download the interface from the original link we received it will give you a slightly updated version of TGC (version 1.4.1) that is supposed to address those issues. Havent downloaded it yet myself as my issues resolved and didn't want to poke at it.

[longhornlove]

So I'll need to delete and reinstall?

[Ironstrokes]

So I'll need to delete and reinstall?

I believe so but not sure, may just be able to run the interface installer again without deleting it but not 100% on that

[ProTee United]

Just run the installer again. Select the interface (not the game). This will update the interface to version 1.42.

[TeaPeg]

I have had the same issue with increase missed shots the last two updates and while lowering it a touch did help, there's still way too many that are missed.

So are people getting the same number of no-reads with both the SkyTrak app and TGC? What about other software? The OP mentioned it was both ST & TGC for him but is everyone else noticing this? Would be good to know if it's the SkyTrak or TGC that is problematic.

[nickm52]

Update:

I lowered my unit to .25-.5" lower than my hitting mat and I factory reset the unit. I have significantly lowered my number of misreads. I had about 10 total with almost all of them in TGC. I found that with my unit for flops/chips I need to have the ball right on the dot. Irons 1" behind and my 3 wood around 2" back. Once I did that I had only maybe 1 misread and I might have just not put the ball in the proper spot.

I am going to try to update the interface tonight.

Thanks for all the help.