Who runs Handlebar HQ
I’m Cal Brennan. That’s a pen name — I ride, I write about the electronics riders bolt to their handlebars, and I’d rather keep my real name off the internet. Everything else here is straight: the products, the prices, the sources, and the opinions.
I’ve been riding for a bit over twenty years and spent most of my working life as a field-service technician — which is a polite way of saying I spent years diagnosing why a screen won’t turn on, why a Bluetooth link keeps dropping, and why a wire someone else routed has chafed through. That habit of reading the spec sheet, the firmware notes and the failure reports before forming an opinion is what this site runs on.
What this site covers
Only the tech layer: CarPlay and Android Auto screens, dedicated GPS units, phone mounts, dash cams, helmet intercoms, trackers, chargers, and tire-pressure sensors. No helmet reviews, no bike reviews, no jackets. There are plenty of good sites for those. There isn’t one that takes rider electronics seriously, and that’s the gap I’m trying to fill.
How the reviews are made
Handlebar HQ does not claim hands-on testing. Each review is built from the manufacturer’s published specifications and firmware history, independent tests from outlets that do get units on bikes, and — the part most reviews skip — hundreds of owner reports from forums, Reddit, retailer reviews and Trustpilot, weighted towards people who’ve lived with a product for a season rather than a week. Where owners disagree, I say so. Where the only evidence is the manufacturer’s word, I say that too. The full method is on the Editorial & Research Policy page.
Some links on this site are affiliate links, which means I may earn a commission if you buy through them at no extra cost to you. It never affects what I recommend — details on the Affiliate Disclosure page.
Questions, corrections, or a product you think I should cover? Get in touch.