Hello, just joined Zwift, with noted indoor bike. The app and bike easily connected and in my first workout all functions such as cadence, output, work correctly.
Merach manual says auto resistance change should work with Zwift (It does with Kinomap), but no joy.
I have looked and note the bike is not officially supported in Zwift, but I’m hoping someone here has the same bike with a solution or someone with more brains than I can help.
Android table is what I use.
TIA
Hello @Mark_Goodrich and welcome to the forums.
I’m not familiar with this bike or know if it should be changing resistance automatically, but you should be connecting (pairing) it as both power and resistance on the pairing screen when first starting up Zwift.
Yes, Mike, thanks for replying. The app actually did connect with both. I’ll try a hilly route tomorrow and see if I can get it to work.
Some previous discussion of the Merach S09
Thanks, Paul, discouraging thread, that. If I can’t use the auto resistance change feature with Zwift, I’ll likely have Amazon come pick the bike up.
So that raises the question, is there a bike in this price range that DOES do all the standard stuff like cadence, power, and auto resistance? The Merach is good quality, esp at around $400.
You might still want to try pairing via the QZ app and see if that makes it more usable.
There are no good low-priced spin bikes. Maybe someday, not today.
Thanks, I may do that if I can’t get it to work. I’m so new to Zwuft I have to learn what this Companion app does, too.
One of the benefits of QZ is that the developer (@Roberto_Viola) will provide a lot of support to debug interoperability problems. He’s helped many people make spin bikes work with Zwift. There is also a qdomyos-zwift Facebook group where you might find other Merach bike owners using QZ.
The Companion app provides an alternate way to pair your equipment, so you could try that as well, but in theory it should not make a difference.
Thanks, Paul.
The Zwift hub one is on sale with a 10% off code, includes a year of zwift membership too so that puts it within your budget… of course you need a bike to put on it, assuming you have one.
Thanks for the suggestion, Mike, ill look into it, but I would prefer something like the Merach that’s fully functional with zwift.
Unfortunately fully functional Zwift compatible smart bikes are expensive. Start at $2,000 and move up.
Stages SB20
Wahoo Kickr Shift
I think Mike was suggesting it would be cheaper to buy a smart direct driver trainer (which does all the things you want) and using it either with a bike you already own or a used bike you could buy.
Qz developer here, let me know if you have any questions
Thanks, yes, I understood what Mike was suggesting, and if I can’t get the Merach to work I will probably get the trainer.
Success, at least for the moment, with the auto resistance. Tried a few minutes of a hilly route, with grades from -2% to +6% and the bike adjusted resistance accordingly, with no need to do anything other than connect to Zwift.
I will try a longer hill ride in the next day or two as time permits, and will update.
Okay, yes, the Merach does in fact change resistance based on Zwift grade percentage. I did a 30 minute ride called something like “Latta Lava” with varying degrees of grade and the bike increased/decreased resistance in time with the changes.
However, as with Merach’s own riding app, on the flats or downhills it stays at level 1. At that level my cadence shoots way up, typically above 100, with hardly any perceived resistance, and it’s practically impossible to get my heart rate into my Zone 2 range. Manually changing resistance defaults after a few seconds to match the bike’s interpretation of Zwift grade…usually back to 1.
I then tried a bit of a HIIT workout called “Sevens”; resistance stayed at Level 1, so to do the intervals I had to increase cadence way above 120, again without much perceived increase in effort.
So, yep, it works, but nope, I’ve not gotten it dialed in to be able to mimic real riding.
I should probably mention that to give you an idea of how easy Level 1 is, at age 75 the effort is not enough to get my heart rate into a basic, low Zone 2 zone.
Perhaps a few suggestions for more vigorous workouts/rides would get me where I want to be…
Mark
I just bought this bike
Were you able to get it working?
I ended up finding a used Stages bike, but get the QZ app, you should be fine.
Just wanted to chime in here for future readers looking for the Merach S09 advice like myself:
The auto-resistance works properly with Zeift via the QZ app as of my personal experience in January 2025.
The aforementionned issues with the “flat road” resistance being set to 1 can be changed in the QZ app under “bike settings”. It’s literally called “flat road resistance offset” and whatever you set here will add to your flat road resistance on the bike (so offset 10 means QZ will set you to resistance 11 at 0% gradient).
You can also fine tune other variables to calibrate the auto-resistance so it’s just right.
One thing I did notice is that you need to restart the QZ app and re-connect it whenever you change the offset. Or ar least it wasn’t immediately updating for me and restarting seemed to fix it.
Anyway, I hope this helps Merach S09 owners get into Zwift in the future!
Further update!
Adding to this because it was unclear for me despite being obvious in retrospect.
When you are cycling on ROUTES, you want to go into QZ > Zwift Settings and make sure the ERG mode toggle is OFF. This will allow the app to adjust your incline resistance properly.
When you are doing a WORKOUT, such as the first two Tutorial exercises, you want ERG mode to be ON. There’s a few other settings here but basically the thing to know is that during workouts, your resistance will be adjusted based on your proximity to the target output, not the incline.
This specifically is something that made me think the app was not working at first. I got Zwift because of features like the incline adjustment and then despite my first tutorial rides being clearly “in the world” with a visible incline meter, the incline was not adjusting because they are flagged as “workouts”.
So TLDR; the Merach S09 works great with the QZ app once you understand that you have to toggle ERG on and off depending on which activity type you are playing.
Routes = ERG OFF = Incline adjustment
Workouts = ERG ON = output proximity adjustment
I’m sure someone more experience with QZ or Zwift can fill in anything I’m missing.
I hope this helps some future reader. Cheers!