Compact, covert, Dashcam and wiring questions

[Nick72]

Hi y'all 

Thinking about adding a Dashcam to the car. Forward facing. Partly for mitigation of bad driver shannigans and partly to record some of the trail trips, mountain and forest roads. 

Looking for something discrete so it doesn't become a theft target. No need for a screen. 

I see you can get an OBD2 adapter to take power off. No idea where the port is on the PHEV? Either that or a spare USB port somewhere or fuse box connection? Anyone with experience? Or better just to get one professionally fitted? How does the Toyota offering compare?

No too bothered about parking mode although it would be a very nice bonus to have video of any issues. I see that many Dashcams will text you if an inertial event has been detected.

Considering these two but there may be better others?

Garmin Dash Cam Mini 3, Super Compact Dash Cam, 140-degree Field of View, Voice Controlled, Incident Detection, 1080p HD Video, Built in Clarity Polariser, Parking Guard https://amzn.eu/d/1ykDGIi

Nextbase Piqo 2K Car Dash Cam – Small & Mighty! Mini 2 K Ultra-Wide 145°, Voice Control & ESOS, Witness & Guardian Lite - Advanced Wifi 2.4, 10Hz GPS, bluetooth 4.1 - Smart Parking, NB App, NBPICO2 https://amzn.eu/d/6dRUZYR

 

My ideal is a small compact unit with a camera at the front, one facing backwards (without needing a second installation), 2k plus resolution with wide field of view, no screen, parking incident alerts by text or email, auto recording and tagging in case of an auto detected incident or one that I decide, and parking video recording using its own built in or a separate powerbank rather than flattening the teeny weeny 12V Battery we have on the hybrid and PHEV RAVs.

[GBgraham]

I have a front and rear wifi with a 32gb card, it is mounted on the screen and it is small enough so I can't see it for the rear view mirror. It's a cheap and cheerful Chinese product, (what isn't these days). Most seem to come with a plug for the cig type socket which in the RAV4 is only ignition fed, I'm happy for now with it like this even though the unit has the facility for motion recording which would benefit a permanent feed, if I used the car daily I would do this.

The OBD2 is just under the edge of the panel that goes down to the pedals. (I think these day all OBD2 has to be around 100mm from the steering column) I am not sure if the OBD2 has a permanent or ignition feed. The fuse box is just above the pedals in the area of the OBD2 so a jumper fuse connection could be used to get a permanent feed say the fuse for the interior lights. Remember mine is LHD but I can image everything will be mirrored across. 

 

[Nick72]

18 minutes ago, GBgraham said:

I have a front and rear wifi with a 32gb card, it is mounted on the screen and it is small enough so I can't see it for the rear view mirror. It's a cheap and cheerful Chinese product, (what isn't these days). Most seem to come with a plug for the cig type socket which in the RAV4 is only ignition fed, I'm happy for now with it like this even though the unit has the facility for motion recording which would benefit a permanent feed, if I used the car daily I would do this.

The OBD2 is just under the edge of the panel that goes down to the pedals. (I think these day all OBD2 has to be around 100mm from the steering column) I am not sure if the OBD2 has a permanent or ignition feed. The fuse box is just above the pedals in the area of the OBD2 so a jumper fuse connection could be used to get a permanent feed say the fuse for the interior lights. Remember mine is LHD but I can image everything will be mirrored across. 

 

Thanks super helpful! 

I was wondering if I should try this with a powerbank that can charge and deliver power at the same time. I'm just mystified why this isn't just a thing.

I mean, I can get a 50 quid powerbank with 50Ahrs of energy storage. The Garmin Mini uses I think about a third of an amp when recording (need to check) so in principle I get 150hrs of power when the ignition is off. 6 days. I use my car for a decent trip probably twice a week. 

Wondering if there's a fatal flaw in my idea.

 

[Paul john]

7 minutes ago, Nick72 said:

Thanks super helpful! 

I was wondering if I should try this with a powerbank that can charge and deliver power at the same time. I'm just mystified why this isn't just a thing.

I mean, I can get a 50 quid powerbank with 50Ahrs of energy storage. The Garmin Mini uses I think about a third of an amp when recording (need to check) so in principle I get 150hrs of power when the ignition is off. 6 days. I use my car for a decent trip probably twice a week. 

Wondering if there's a fatal flaw in my idea.

 

Thinking of doing the same. 

[Nick72]

So apparently a few but not all power banks support "pass through charging" meaning they can simultaneously power a device whilst they're being charged.

Since I'm now not using the charging pad on the car, as I've got a high speed wireless charger phone holder as of yesterday, I was thinking of just using that space for a powerbank tucked away in there or on a tray you can buy which I can modify. 

The power consumption of something small like the Garmin Mini 3 is tiny so most of the incoming power from say the cigarette lighter is going into charging the power bank. 

Still astonished this isn't a done thing for parking mode cameras or continuous recording. 

[Nick72]

This Anker unit seems to have pass through. Good brand, sophicated Battery monitoring and disconnect, avoid burning down the car.

It's only 24000mAhrs but that should still be 3 days of recording and even longer in a low power park mode. 

Deal: Anker Power Bank, 24,000mAh 3-Port Portable Charger with 140W Output, 737 (PowerCore 24K), Smart Digital Display, Compatible with iPhone 16/15/14/13 Series, Samsung, Dell, AirPods, and More https://amzn.eu/d/hFSDu4l

 

 

[Heidfirst]

1 hour ago, Nick72 said:

How does the Toyota offering compare?

Toyota's standard Nextbase is quite bulky & only 1080. The advantage as a dealer fit is all encompassing warranty cover.

 

10 minutes ago, Nick72 said:

So apparently a few but not all power banks support "pass through charging" meaning they can simultaneously power a device whilst they're being charged.

<snip>

Still astonished this isn't a done thing for parking mode cameras or continuous recording. 

There are solutions but they are often multiple £hundreds. e.g. if I was getting something done locally without warranty concerns I would go with https://www.dash-camman.co.uk/dash-cams.html but you can see that their extended parking options do not come cheap.

Thinkware also make good, discreet dash cameras & have good UK support.

[GBgraham]

This is a lot cheaper and less clutter

 

[Nick72]

19 minutes ago, Heidfirst said:

Toyota's standard Nextbase is quite bulky & only 1080. The advantage as a dealer fit is all encompassing warranty cover.

 

There are solutions but they are often multiple £hundreds. e.g. if I was getting something done locally without warranty concerns I would go with https://www.dash-camman.co.uk/dash-cams.html but you can see that their extended parking options do not come cheap.

Thinkware also make good, discreet dash cameras & have good UK support.

Thank you. 

That's made my mind up. I can make something based around the Garmin Mini 3 for a tiny fraction of the cost and which has double the run time when parked than the examples on sale. Motion detection I can do on the laptop at home post event with recorded footage from the 512GB SD card, to find what happened.

Feels like there's an unexploited market for something like this in the simple cheap as chips sense. 

Tesla has cracked this in their systems and it would great if I could add on similar capabilities to the RAV.

I also note the wife's new electric Mini, coming next week, automatically saves incident footage from it's cameras, and you can just set it to record short clips. Looks very neat and I'll no doubt be roped in to get everything working.

[GBgraham]

€42.00

[GBgraham]

 Do people really think the more you pay the better it is 🤔 

[Heidfirst]

21 minutes ago, Nick72 said:

Thank you. 

That's made my mind up. I can make something based around the Garmin Mini 3 for a tiny fraction of the cost and which has double the run time when parked than the examples on sale. Motion detection I can do on the laptop at home post event with recorded footage from the 512GB SD card, to find what happened.

 

please keep us updated.

[Cyker]

The most discreet ones I've seen are the fitcamx range, as they integrate into the ADAS sensor pod and tap power from it too, which makes installation very easy.

However most dashcams are pretty small - I've been quite a fan of the Viofo range as they are a compact wedge shape which have a small screen to aid positioning, but are otherwise small and easy to hide behind the rear view mirror.

 

Running the power cables will be the tricky bit - Most people favour a piggy-back fuse, but one annoying downside with them is the fuse cover won't go back on as it sticks up too much. I ran mine into the back of the lighter socket which was a PITA to get at but meant I didn't need to touch the fuses.

I'd also recommend using an SD card rated for Dashcam use and not a normal one, unless you don't mind swapping it out every 1-2 years - I've been using ones with the Max Endurance branding from Sandisk and they've been very reliable and robust so far, with 5 years of continuous use and still working! (Unlike their Ultra and Extreme cards, which started randomly corrupting footage after less than a year of use, and the Dashcam errored out on just over)

 

Your observation about needing a power bank that can charge AND power at the same time is a good one as a lot of people don't realize that the vast majority can't do that; It's because it requires more sophisticated electronics to make it work safely and reliably (If you just wire them both in the obvious way it reduces the life of the Battery dramatically), and most powerbanks don't want to spend that extra money as they are targeting lowest cost over anything else.

However, are you sure that Anker power bank supports that ability? The only powerbanks I know of that are verified to support pass-through charging and are easily available are made by Blackvue and Powercore, and the prices are... high... for both. To my knowledge, no current Anker product supports pass-through charging.

[Nick72]

5 hours ago, GBgraham said:

 Do people really think the more you pay the better it is 🤔 

Kind of agree but I also think it depends. On the face of it there are better options for a third the price of the Garmin Mini 3. But... 

They just work.

The software is great (I'm a Garmin smart watch owner).

My data is not going to China. 

It probably won't stop working within 2 years.

Not quite sure what I'm going to do yet but I don't mind paying over the odds if the above is true. 

We have two external and one internal nest cams. They were expensive and the subscription is expensive, but I love the responsiveness and software. Tried others including non subscription solutions over the years and they were poor even though the camera specs looked good.

 

[Nick72]

5 hours ago, Cyker said:

The most discreet ones I've seen are the fitcamx range, as they integrate into the ADAS sensor pod and tap power from it too, which makes installation very easy.

However most dashcams are pretty small - I've been quite a fan of the Viofo range as they are a compact wedge shape which have a small screen to aid positioning, but are otherwise small and easy to hide behind the rear view mirror.

 

Running the power cables will be the tricky bit - Most people favour a piggy-back fuse, but one annoying downside with them is the fuse cover won't go back on as it sticks up too much. I ran mine into the back of the lighter socket which was a PITA to get at but meant I didn't need to touch the fuses.

I'd also recommend using an SD card rated for dashcam use and not a normal one, unless you don't mind swapping it out every 1-2 years - I've been using ones with the Max Endurance branding from Sandisk and they've been very reliable and robust so far, with 5 years of continuous use and still working! (Unlike their Ultra and Extreme cards, which started randomly corrupting footage after less than a year of use, and the dashcam errored out on just over)

 

Your observation about needing a power bank that can charge AND power at the same time is a good one as a lot of people don't realize that the vast majority can't do that; It's because it requires more sophisticated electronics to make it work safely and reliably (If you just wire them both in the obvious way it reduces the life of the battery dramatically), and most powerbanks don't want to spend that extra money as they are targeting lowest cost over anything else.

However, are you sure that Anker power bank supports that ability? The only powerbanks I know of that are verified to support pass-through charging and are easily available are made by Blackvue and Powercore, and the prices are... high... for both. To my knowledge, no current Anker product supports pass-through charging.

Thanks and super helpful.

Checking out the suggestions.

The Anker one at the link has a buyer question of does it support pass through and the Anker UK support answered yes it does. A purchaser also answered to the same effect. All it will mean is the device charging ports will be wired in parallel to the input port (as well as being wired to Battery output for when there is no input power) with some management electronics. Unnecessary complications as you say for most power banks. 

I'll probably order it next week and test it out. If it doesn't do what they say I'll send it back.

I'll probably run the cable around the passenger side windscreen, use some discreet stick on cable clips, under the dash, and to the cigarette lighter (or powerbank which will be connected to the cig lighter). I've got a high power cable cig adapter with two USB A ports on it. One of those is connected to a phone holder with fast wireless charging so I can use the phone keyboard and display Clino and other apps whilst AA is running. This seems to work so far. Phone holder is attached to the right of driver dashboard vent which is a really handy spot. 

I may iterate around this a few times until I find something I'm happy with. I've got a spare tray unit which goes in over the charging pad so I may make a little cradle under that for the power bank. And hide any excess wires in that. 

[Nick72]

5 hours ago, Cyker said:

The most discreet ones I've seen are the fitcamx range, as they integrate into the ADAS sensor pod and tap power from it too, which makes installation very easy.

However most dashcams are pretty small - I've been quite a fan of the Viofo range as they are a compact wedge shape which have a small screen to aid positioning, but are otherwise small and easy to hide behind the rear view mirror.

 

Running the power cables will be the tricky bit - Most people favour a piggy-back fuse, but one annoying downside with them is the fuse cover won't go back on as it sticks up too much. I ran mine into the back of the lighter socket which was a PITA to get at but meant I didn't need to touch the fuses.

I'd also recommend using an SD card rated for dashcam use and not a normal one, unless you don't mind swapping it out every 1-2 years - I've been using ones with the Max Endurance branding from Sandisk and they've been very reliable and robust so far, with 5 years of continuous use and still working! (Unlike their Ultra and Extreme cards, which started randomly corrupting footage after less than a year of use, and the dashcam errored out on just over)

 

Your observation about needing a power bank that can charge AND power at the same time is a good one as a lot of people don't realize that the vast majority can't do that; It's because it requires more sophisticated electronics to make it work safely and reliably (If you just wire them both in the obvious way it reduces the life of the battery dramatically), and most powerbanks don't want to spend that extra money as they are targeting lowest cost over anything else.

However, are you sure that Anker power bank supports that ability? The only powerbanks I know of that are verified to support pass-through charging and are easily available are made by Blackvue and Powercore, and the prices are... high... for both. To my knowledge, no current Anker product supports pass-through charging.

Thanks on the SD card front too. Experienced this issue on cameras in the past. I'll probably go for a high end card and as big as the Dashcam can support. SanDisk or similar as you say.

[Cyker]

Keep us posted! I'm especially curious if that Anker really does support pass-through charging as that'd be a game changer!

 

[Nick72]

10 minutes ago, Cyker said:

Keep us posted! I'm especially curious if that Anker really does support pass-through charging as that'd be a game changer!

 

Agreed. I thought this could be the fatal flaw in my plan. That powerbanks can't be charging whilst they're also supplying power to connected devices. But pass through as it is called solves this but is only available on some powerbanks. I'm hoping it will work well if I get a Dashcam that only draws a small amount of power like the Garmin Mini 3. Saw a video with it drawing only 0.33A when recording (at 5V is only about 1.7W). Think it was down to 0.2A when in park mode. So it should hardly make a difference to anything.

[Nick72]

45 minutes ago, Cyker said:

Keep us posted! I'm especially curious if that Anker really does support pass-through charging as that'd be a game changer!

 

Right, so, there are mixed statements in the Amazon Q & A about the Anker unit. Some saying it does and others not. I'm wondering if it's behaviour is a function of how much power can go in and how much you're drawing out. I just want it to power the connected webcam and use the rest of the input power to charge the Battery.

It seems that this powerbank can do it, designed for solar charging whilst simultaneously supporting device power. Makes sense. 

V75 Universal USB Battery Pack for Smartphones & Tablets https://amzn.eu/d/8WoclL8

Hopefully in the next couple of weeks I'll have something working and installed in a tray above the charging pad on the RAV. 

[ernieb]

Buy it, try it and if it does not work send it back. Especially if it’s shipped by Amazon.

[Nick72]

6 hours ago, ernieb said:

Buy it, try it and if it does not work send it back. Especially if it’s shipped by Amazon.

Just ordered thanks Ernie. Went for a Garmin Mini 3 and the Anker powerbank before trying the other one. There are better specs and cheaper elsewhere as pointed out on the Dashcam front but if it all comes together with the power bank then I'm going to be happy. Otherwise I'll just send it all back. 

Probably fettle next weekend. Make sure it all works as I imagined and if so I'll build it into the spare tray I've got which sits in the cubby above the wireless charging plate. Will post pics. 

[GBgraham]

The RAV4 is so easy to install even when including the rear camera, No panel removal only the door seals. Non scratch panel tool would be an advantage.

[Nick72]

Got all the kit. Now need to try it out. Saturday or Sunday job. 

[Strangely Brown]

9 hours ago, Nick72 said:

Got all the kit. Now need to try it out. Saturday or Sunday job. 

Do I understand correctly that you will be using the powerbank to provide the power when parked rather than wired directly into the car? i.e.

Car -> Powerbank -> Camera

Edit: sounds like an ideal solution in the absence of a backup Battery directly in the camera.

[Nick72]

12 hours ago, Strangely Brown said:

Do I understand correctly that you will be using the powerbank to provide the power when parked rather than wired directly into the car? i.e.

Car -> Powerbank -> Camera

Edit: sounds like an ideal solution in the absence of a backup battery directly in the camera.

Correct. 3 days continuous video recording or 4 days in park mode where it records any incidents, texts you, or let's you dial in via 4G to see the recording or live feed subject to subscription. All independent of the car Battery. 

Building and testing this weekend.

Will integrate with the spare tray I've got that suits in the cubby above the charging plate.