5AM rides are always going to be a little nerve wracking. There you are, barely awake and sharing the road with equally groggy drivers in vehicles that weight 100X more than yours does. But for those of us who leave family members at home, we know that they’re always going to be even more nervous for us. Because until you come home, they truly have no idea where you are or what may have happened to you.

The ICEdot Crash Sensor is meant to change that by providing instantaneous notifications to your loved ones in the event of an incident. We covered what makes the ICEdot so special and unique in our first ride post here. But for those who missed it, the sensor is comprised of two important components – an accelerometer and Bluetooth connection. With these components, the sensor maintains a connection to your phone and, if the worst happens, triggers an alert on your phone that sends text messages to any emergency contacts you have setup on the ICEdot website.

Fortunately we were never able to provide a true test of the ICEdot. While we are willing to do almost anything to provide the most comprehensive review of a product, we do draw the line at intentionally crashing on the bike. However, we did spend many hundreds of miles riding with the ICEdot to determine how it works, whether it will create false alarms, and if we think it is worth the $149 that ICEdot charges.

So let’s answer the last question first – is it worth $149? Absolutely! For those who leave worried spouses and family home, having a product that can provide piece of mind is tough to put a price on. However, we have to admit that the price does seem a little high when you consider that the Rideye is going to offer a crash camera for a similar price. But we still have no problem paying the current price for the ICEdot.

Regarding false alarms, in all of the miles with the ICEdot we never once had it send out a false crash signal. This was actually incredibly important to us since the last thing you want to have happen is to come home from a ride to find your family panicked because they received a text saying you had crashed. However, we did notice that the ICEdot lose connection with our phones twice after very long (3+ hour) rides. We never determined a root cause, but ICEdot assured us that this is not a consistent problem and offered to replace our sensor if we chose.

ICEdot claims the sensor has enough battery power for 20 hours of ride time and 30 days of standby. One of our few criticisms of the sensor is that it is quite easy to forget to charge. Since it was attached to our helmet, we found that we often forgot to charge the sensor post ride. And unfortunately we were only reminded that the power had been drained when we went to use it on our next ride and found the sensor to have little or no power. Although we honestly are not sure how ICEdot might resolve this (though a text message to our phone when the power is low is an option).

So the biggest question really is this: would we use the ICEdot senor on every ride? Our answer is a resounding “yes.” When the biggest complaint we had was forgetting to recharge it, we really have very little to complain about. This is an outstanding product that provides a huge leap forward in safety. We expect to see competitors come to market in the not-too-distant future, which should help to lower the price of the ICEdot. But until then, $149 is a price that we are more than willing to pay to provide family with a piece of mind like never before.