Blue Tipz Tip Up Alert System

[Bureaucrat]

Has anyone tried this? Does it run off a blue tooth signal?

I've got a Scheels gift card burning a hole in my pocket. I think I am going to pick one up to try it.

If i'm the first I'll let ya know. I'm heading out next on 12/13 for some eyes and a shot at my dream 46" pike.

[Dogzlife000]

Well, I picked up a couple. I use an Iphone 4S and they work fine but I have yet to have an opportunity to try them on the ice. I'm particularly interested in effective range through my metal-sided fish house.

[B-man715]

Curious as well. I always thought the range of bluetooth was somewhere around 30'???

Maybe these have a way of amplifying the signal to reach out a lot farther???

Awesome idea if it works!!

[fishing 101]

It worked to 56' in my house. Haven't had it out on lake yet. Cool concept.

[EngineerBob]

It uses Bluetooth Low Energy, which is pretty new. BLE has a typical range up to 150 yards, and these have been tested out to 200 yards. Metal-sided shacks do reduce the range, but if you have a window, even if it's not directly facing the tip-up, putting your phone next to the window will usually work pretty well.

[B-man715]

Doesn't work with any of our Android devices(couple moto's and a Galaxy tab II or my Iphone 4 workphone) because it isn't an S.

One of the guys at the DeepFreezeFishing booth said that in a couple weeks it will work with 4.1.2?????? (Because it will be updated with BLE??) I hope so or I have some really spendy tip up light's until I get a new phone running 4.3 or an 5S

It is a very neat system that is a step ahead of StrikeSensor's technology!

[buzbunni]

One of a few cool new products that I saw at the St. Paul Ice Show. Can't wait to try it.

[slurpie]

I bought a couple of theses also and have tried them out. Work great on an I phone. That is all they work with. I was talking with them in the booth yesterday they kept saying droid 4.3 is out in a phone but it is not. I went to buy a droid 2 days ago droid 4.3 does not exist.just needs more development time. Will be a very cool addition when it works on more phones. Had them out last night worked at fifty feet away. I do think they will really burn phone battery also.

[Bureaucrat]

I haven't picked mine up yet. I stopped at Scheels in Sioux Falls, they didn't have any, in spite of the Blue Tipz HSOforum that said Scheels carried them.

If you're looking, I'd call ahead or just order online.

[Wolffy]

Hey slurpie I have a galaxy s4 and its running 4.3 and has been for 2 months I beleive.

[slurpie]

Sorry forgot about the galaxy. My buddy has that phone blue tips told him it would work on there but it does not, they are working on that also. I meant a motorola droid does not have 4.3 yet. I think it will be a good product just need more time.

[servocam]

You can buy them on Amazon in a 2pk. They are on my Xmas list :-)

[borg0196]

I couldn't find any on amazon?

[beebsout]

I tried one out last week. Worked pretty well on my iPhone as noted by others. In testing, the system failed to alert about 30% of the time where the test was the device within arm length of my phone ... so that made me worried about it working always. It did signal through my hard side house at about 80' ... but not a lot of tip up action to confirm it always works.

The aspect I didn't like is that it rapidly depleted my phone battery. That isn't the biggest problem if you are sitting in a house and your phone is plugged in, but when I was fishing outside and had my phone in my pocket, it went down too quick.

As a tip up fishermen, I love this concept and am excited they have put the technology together. Completely worth the money in my book!

[Redlineracer12]

I have not had great luck with mine working, but this was only my second time using them. Most of the issues I've had are not really to be blamed on the bluetipz units themselves. One of my older tipups it is very difficult to find a spot on the flag pole large enough where the transmitter won't interfere with the operation of the flag. Once it was located in a proper spot where the flag could freely be tripped, the flag wouldn't stand up straight enough for the unit to be triggered (leaning flag). I went and bought a new tipup with a lot more room for the unit and stiffer flag spring and of course didn't get a single flag this weekend on it.

Even when the flag was standing properly though the first time out (blue tipz unit was sending signal too) I didn't have a single alarm go off with several flags. I noticed when I went back into the app (background) on my phone it had since stopped scanning. If I had the app open and it said scanning it would go off everytime when the flag was up though. So maybe that's just an issue with the way my iPhone 4s is putting it in the background. I'm hoping with a little more practice I can get these dialed in because the idea is awesome.

[slurpie]

After using them they could be a good product but I feel they need more r and d first. There can be up to a 15 sec delay on an I phone before it picks up the signal. Not bad but I bought them thinking flag up beeper goes off not so. After walking toward the tip up watching it go up and getting no beep a couple times I lost confidence in them. The blue tipz company was very good in trying to figure the problem out but i tried settings on the phone and tripping the flag when others were using their phone with no luck. Good luck to you guys using them. Seems like a good company to buy from. I use some other things that work as soon as the flag is up but I gotta carry a separate pager reciever. That's what I thought was gonna be great about blue tipz. My buddy still can't get his to work with his galaxy.

[EngineerBob]

beebsout, I think I can explain your 30% problem at arms length. In the app we put a 10 second reset time in so that it doesn't alert multiple times for the same event. So if you tip it up, the app alerts, then you tip it down for 5 seconds, and tip it back up, it won't alert again because it doesn't treat that as a new event. If you tip it up, the app alerts, you tip it down for at least ten seconds, and then tip it back up again, it will alert again. We did this because sometimes at the far end of the range, or inside steel shacks, not all of the transmissions will get through, so it can be a few seconds between signals. We didn't want a single event to trigger the alarm many times.

What phone do you have? With the iOS devices we've tested, it didn't affect the battery life at all. We haven't done extensive battery testing on too many Android devices.

[EngineerBob]

slurpie, with iOS when the app is running in the background, Apple controls the rate at which the app scans, and to save battery they made it around 15 seconds. Unfortunately no amount of R&D will let us tell the big boys at Apple how to open up their system so we can scan faster. Sometimes you'll get a signal right during that scanning window and it'll be a near instant notification, and sometimes you'll get a signal right after that scanning window closes and it takes up to 15 seconds to get to the next scanning window. When the app is open, Apple scans constantly, so it is instant.

[Redlineracer12]

EngineerBob, I have had a few instances where I went back to using my phone while the app was set to "scanning" only to open the app back up later and have it show "not scanning". Do you have any tips on how to keep it scanning when in the background? Any settings on the phone I should tweak?

iOS 7.0.4 on a 4S.

[EngineerBob]

We had an update to the app right before Christmas. Make sure you have updated the app. We experienced that problem a bit, too, but thought we had fixed it with this latest update. What's happening is iOS needs more memory for the active app, so it kills stuff in the background, including the BlueTipz app. It's not just turning off scanning, it's killing the app entirely. Our app should be staying active, just like a music app that continues to play music in the background. Let me know if the update still doesn't fix it; we can put you on our beta test list so you can get updates to test before we push them out to everyone. I don't think there are any settings on the phone you can change.

[borg0196]

So if I have version 4.3 on my S3 I should be good to get these?

[slurpie]

See if you can download the app. If you can down load then they should work. If you know someone with them try to use theirs first to see if your going to like them.

[CAMAN]

Most people can install it, but if you open it and it says "Bluetipz transmitter cannot be used with this device since bluetooth low energy is not supported" then it will not work with your phone until you email them that you purchased one and then they MAY send out an update for your phone model.

Not good business practice if you ask me, just make an update for all phones so they all work then allow your customers to purchase. I honestly will never buy one until I know my phone works with it. Not rely on someone I have never met to do something now that they have my money.

[Redlineracer12]

Most people can install it, but if you open it and it says "Bluetipz transmitter cannot be used with this device since bluetooth low energy is not supported" then it will not work with your phone until you email them that you purchased one and then they MAY send out an update for your phone model.

You can't possibly expect them to support every phone O/S ever created... They pretty clearly mention what versions are supported.

[CAMAN]

You can't possibly expect them to support every phone O/S ever created... They pretty clearly mention what versions are supported.

I didn't say every O/S(blackberry, windows, etc) but it shouldn't be this hard to get the most popular phones on the Android lineup(Galaxy) to be supported. Earlier in this thread I mentioned my phone (Note 2 which is one of the most popular phones on Android) and the company rep never even responded about it. Why should I buy something then hope they can get it to work? A reviewer even stated he emailed the owner of the company and he said something like "if you buy it we will update for your phone" I won't be one who 'buys and hopes'. They are missing out on an entire demographic of phones by not getting the entire Galaxy lineup supported. I understand technology and these are pretty reasonable expectations.