Replacing Battery in Wahoo Elemnt Roam v1

I love cycling, and like any passionate rider, I have a few bikes. And like every respectable biker, I use a cycling computer.

Mine is an older one - the Wahoo Elemnt Roam v1. It covers all my daily needs perfectly: heart rate, cadence, speed, and navigation.

It’s a wonderful device or at least it was until recently, when its battery died. Fully charged, it lasted only 7 km before dying completely.

So, I decided to replace the battery, and in this post, I’ll show you how to do it too!

Required Equipment

• Heat gun or hair dryer (if your wife lends you her dyson)
• Soldering iron and soldering skills
• replacement battery: Akyga Li-Po LP674261 3.7V 2000mAh
• plastic prying tool

Disassembly

There is no screws and device simply glued together like hell.
To soften the glue, use a heat gun (at low heat) and heat up the edge of the top case.

Here is how I held the device and applied heat:

Make it really hot and use plastic prying tool, put in into the notch and pry open the device. Do not rush and take your time, device glued like hell!

Once you have the opening rest will be easy. No more heat needed.

Be careful with battery ribbon cables at bottom left corner of the device, do not damage them!

Battery Inspection

Here is what I found in my device after dissasembling:

Yeah, looks like a baloon :)
Here is the default battery specs:

HD584158PLV 2000mAh
3.8V 19E13 20190717

New battery specs:

AKY0640
LP674261
3.7V 2000mAh, 7.40Wh
DC202503

Replacement

Since my soldering skills aren’t the best, I handed this part over to my father. :)

1. Swap the Boards

The new battery came with its own small PCB (protection board), so we need to reuse the original one.

Mark where the positive and negative wires are on the battery and remove original board.

2. Solder the Original Board to the New Battery

Solder original board to a new battery. Carefully, do not mix positive and negative terminals. The final result should look like this:

Since the original board has different terminals placement we had to add a small wire for one of the connections.

Testing

Reconenct the battery to the main board as well as usb port. Plug in the USB cable and check that it charges properly and powers on from the new battery:

Reassembly

Secure new battery with a double-sided tape or glue to the bottom of the case.

Glue both halves of the case together with some strong and waterproof glue. We used this one:

Apply some pressure and let the glue dry for a few minutes.

Boom! The device is back to life and ready for the next ride!

Conclusion

Even if the manufacturer didn’t design the device to be repairable, it is still possible to replace the battery and give it a second life! If your Wahoo shows similar symptoms, you now know exactly what to do.

Ride safe, and take care of your tech as much as your bike!