Review on 🌡️ Gerbing 12V Portable Dual-Zone Temp Controller: Advanced Climate Control Solution by John Swain

I ride my bike year round so I rely on heated gear to keep me going during the cold months. I had an old Gerbing balaclava, gloves and controller and switched to the new digital dual controller, jacket and pants when the old controller and balaclava became unreliable due to a short in the connectors. The new dual controller has separate controls for the jacket and gloves (heated pants connect to the accessory slot in the jacket). When comparing the old controller to the new one, the wires on the old controller were thicker. Connectors, the weak point of my old Gerbing, look the same. Now I'm very careful when connecting and disconnecting the cables - I hold the plugs and don't pull on the cables and leave the controller attached to the shell to reduce the load. I hope these connectors don't fail like the last ones did. My biggest disappointment with the new microprocessor digital controller is the diagnostic modes. The controller flashes red/green when the voltage falls below 10.5V and flashes red when a short circuit occurs. In either failure mode, it turns off the power. On older bikes (my daily rider is an '87 K75) there is enough voltage variation during the daily stops and bumps from bumper to bumper to constantly set off a low voltage warning and kill the heater. To reset, you need to turn the watch faces completely off and on again. Since you're driving, and in my case in heavy traffic, you have to do it by touching it while wearing thick gloves. This is more than a nuisance - it creates an unsafe distraction and an unsettling situation. I would prefer my old controller if it works. I will buy a case with a clip. This is necessary, otherwise the controller wobbles and I'm often afraid that I'll lose it. Gerbing has always been a supplier of heated equipment. Since they sold the company and removed the lifetime warranty I believe the quality and service has gone downhill. I don't know of a better alternative, but next time I'm going to shell out a few hundred for gear warmers I'll look for a quality alternative.