In car video recorder, dash cam - Z4 coupe dashboard camera

[RichIbizaSport]

I've been fairly worried reading about people who have problems proving who's at fault in insurance claims. There's no way I'd be able to afford insurance on the coupe without any NCB. My friend recently ran in to some trouble with a guy that decided to do a 3 point turn in a 60 mph zone, it ended up going 50/50 and he had to fork out for his £600 excess. All because there were no witnesses.

So I thought I'd do something about it

I purchased the following off ebay for £100.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/HD-1080P-Car- ... 4aafa4f906

It came from HK and took around 12 days to arrive. There's an option to have a GPS attachment so you get speed and position information (£125), but I was rather afraid of incriminating myself . They could work it out by calculating the distance and time obviously, but it's unlikely unless it's really serious.

It's called a v1000, the GPS one is a v1000GS.

There's a review on youtube for the actual camera here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4rwMV7hhaY

I also bought an 8GB class 6 microSD card. It needs to be class 6 for 1080p recording. This cost about £9 on amazon. A 5 minute recording is around 300MB, so your looking at about 2 hours worth of storage. The best features are cycle recording and auto start with power. So it'll start and stop itself with the ignition and overwrite the oldest files if they aren't marked as read only (there's a button to save a section of footage).

I also took some sample footage, knock it up to 1080p to see it in full detail, a section of boring commute to work, nothing interesting:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mJWDEe1FeCY

This arrived:



First job was to get the power wires connected inside the unit so I didn't have to have the power connector plugged in to the bottom of the unit. I'm a bit of a tidy freak



Just a few screw to get in to it and if you're remotely decent with a soldering iron you'll have no problems.

I could have used the mount and window sucker but I wanted it more out of the way, so I knocked up a bracket with some old brass sheet I had laying around. Unfortunately no pictures of this stage but you can see the general shape of it. There's two screw holes on the camera for the standard bracket to I reused them for the custom bracket.

This slides nicely into the roof, the roof lining pushes it firmly again the roof so it's surprisingly solid. I also covered it in single sides foam (it was actually pipe insulation ) to help stop vibrations.





Next job was to get the map lights out so I could tap in to the power source. Very simply jab a flat blade screw driver in to each side nearest you and it falls right out.

Peel back the sticky loom tape and you'll find a violet-white wire and a few brown-black wires. The violet wire is a fused switched +12v (ignition position 1) and the brown-black wires are earths. This is part of the rain/light sensor, I'm unsure of how it'll be for the convertible or M.

See here for wiring diagrams:
http://wds.spaghetticoder.org/en/svg/sp ... vg?m=e8385



Soldered into the the loom



I decided to use spade connectors so I could remove it without having to de-solder.



Make sure you connect to the correct + / - and don't short the wires!
Or you end up with this :
http://www.z4-forum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=33711

Trial fitment, you can see it's not particularly obtrusive to the drivers view:





View from outside:





The yellow light is a reflection of the camera flash don't worry



Job done

Hope this comes in handy if anyone else is looking at doing the same

[WLH]

Nicely done....

[a11y]

Can't see the installation pics here at work but will have a better look tonight. Very keen on this idea and have looked at the RoadHawk products, but the cost has put me off thus far. Hence this looks interesting...

[lacroupade]

I've been fairly worried reading about people who have problems proving who's at fault in insurance claims. There's no way I'd be able to afford insurance on the coupe without any NCB. My friend recently ran in to some trouble with a guy that decided to do a 3 point turn in a 60 mph zone, it ended up going 50/50 and he had to fork out for his £600 excess. All because there were no witnesses.

Not a good example though is it...I mean what if a child wandered on to the road in a 60mph zone, or someone was riding a horse, or a car broke down? I'd say he was lucky to get away with 50/50 unless there were extentuating circumstances.

But like the video idea very much....even a Roadhawk has to be worth it for the potential grief avoidance.

[Taz]

this is great when the accident is not your fault lol, but i fear this device could also be your enemy lol

Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk

[RichIbizaSport]

Not a good example though is it...I mean what if a child wandered on to the road in a 60mph zone, or someone was riding a horse, or a car broke down? I'd say he was lucky to get away with 50/50 unless there were extentuating circumstances.

But like the video idea very much....even a Roadhawk has to be worth it for the potential grief avoidance.

I maybe didn't quite explain it well enough.



Friend is in blue. The car in front slowed down to a crawl, didn't indicate. My friend went around, the other car then went for a 3 point turn.

The other driver said the accident happened on the actual junction, which would also correlate to the damage on both cars.

Point being, for £100 I'd rather not risk it

this is great when the accident is not your fault lol, but i fear this device could also be your enemy lol

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I did think about that, probably half the reason I used spade connectors so I could have it out within 60 seconds But if a crash was my fault I'd like to think I'd admit it

[BMWZ4MC]

A couple of photos from a mobile phone would have been enough to prove that the location of the accident was distant from the junction, but I do agree there is no substitute for realtime footage of the events leading up to an accident, the collision itself, and the drivers' responses to that collision...

I'm thinking seriously about this for track day footage as much as insurance benefits. I can't see the quality of the video / sound as youtube is blocked at work, but I'll look this evening.

Nice installation btw. Are you worried someone may steal it from your car or it not that obvious to a passerby?

[Kryton]

I've also looked at RoadHawk for my next car, but I'm not sure if it will negate the warranty

[deka]

nice install

[krusty]

Nice - but I would have preferred such a device installed in the front bumper area, perhaps in the recess under the fogs ... where, if cleverly done, it could be less noticeable. Cameras can be tiny today ... and the electronics gizmo boxie thingie can go in the bonnet.

[shambolic]

Try this iPhone app though. Really good

Women who doesn't know to give way to the right and a numptie who has no lane discipline on a roundabout either. (look at the lane indicators)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOqBI7he ... ata_player



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hj0WDHbx ... ata_player


Will put up second vid later as processing YouTube still
Added!!!

69p app I've shut off 3G etc by using airplane mode so stops my speed etc coming up

[VvrooomM]

Shambolic - it says try this app but doesn't say what it is!!??


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[tomTVR]

Nice - but I would have preferred such a device installed in the front bumper area, perhaps in the recess under the fogs ... where, if cleverly done, it could be less noticeable. Cameras can be tiny today ... and the electronics gizmo boxie thingie can go in the bonnet.

I was thinking something similar with one facing backwards too. You would probably need to clean the dirt off it every time you drive.

Great install though. I hear about this sort of thing all the time, dodgy driving, staged accidents, no insurance, lying to the insurance company etc. This is a great idea.

You can always turn it off when you go for a hoon otherwise if I cause an accident then I'll own up to it.

[shambolic]

Shambolic - it says try this app but doesn't say what it is!!??


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Sorry it's called Witness Driving.

[inkey$]

Good clean install there Rich Thanks for sharing.