Dash Cam In Car Recorder

Phew, that was close.

(He obviously has never met another vehicle on that road before!)

PB

I live in the centre of a spiders web of narrow roads, surrounded by quarries, O licence depots and JCB factories. Such as that is a daily occurrence - sorry I've got no film, you get used to it.

Peter

Ian are you joking?

I can see the block paving road and a lot of trees.!!
Has he gone by in your picture? What about a number plate photo.

regards

Mike------------------- Just going down to Specsavers.

Click on the picture and a video plays.

Peter

Uploading to YouTube, Photobucket etc. really spoils the video quality dunnit?

(click on the piccy Mike)

Frank

And my Duetto didn't have acceleration like that!!

Peter

I "always" have my Mobius in the car or MH, except for a couple of weeks ago when I took my daughter to the Post Office half a mile away.
Coming back up a narrow road, only room for one car because of parked vans, I slowed right down to about 10-15 mph, lo and behold a blummin' builders Astra shot out from a driveway in front of the parked Transit I was passing, only about 4ft from my bonnet.
ABS went on but I still would have hit him, expensive in a Merc CLK, so I steered into the high kerb instead.
Result, a nice chunk out of my spare set of alloys with winter tyres on.
No footage from absent camera so ins co didn't want to know.

Luckily the tyre wasn't damaged, apart from a slice off the wheel protector and my really good local MOT man cleaned the sharp edges off the wheel, damage hadn't reached the bead seat.

Moral, always have the camera running, as the ins co lady said that would have been a different matter altogether.

I also put the cam in the car the other day without a card in it, in case of an accident I would still have pointed it out to the other driver, hopefully the prospect of (non-existent) video evidence would still do the trick.

Mike,

The video really degrades when you load it on to Photobucket.  Also, due to the filthy windscreen and the angle of the sun it's not possible to read the number plate; but I can read the owner's name and had the tanker collided with "Petal" I feel sure that the driver and I would have had an interesting conversation.
  


Peter,

Watching the acceleration and speed on the video is weird.  It must be a true representation because it films in 5 minute segments and the replay lasts five minutes as I go from "A" to "B"; but it always looks as if I travel at 90 mph and accelerate like a Formula 1 car.

I often wonder what it would look like if I really was going like the clappers instead of going for the 34mpg!.     

We lived in the highlands of Scotland for nearly thirty years with some pretty tortuous roads but I can't say that "smoking tyres" was a regular occurrence, plus I didn't have a camera at the time.   

However, I do remember one occasion when Helen and I were both on our way to work with Helen leading in a car and myself following in a van.  When I got home that evening Helen asked me "Did you see that lorry this morning with all its tyres on fire?"    

This was in reference to the lorry loaded with eight huge tree trunks whose driver had suddenly realised that the driver of the car approaching him (Helen) was NOT going to stop before they simultaneously reached a narrow bridge with no room for them to pass each other!  

Had I seen it?  My heart was in my mouth for the ten or so seconds that it took for Helen to drive past the lorry.     

The black stripes of burned rubber left by the wood-lorry were still marking the road five years later and I got no thanks for pointing them out to Helen every time we passed them!    

Best regards,
  
Ian

The post on the "A bit of a scare today" thread reminded me that I wanted to add something to this one. After I had bought the Mobius, the Mini 801 came out with a GPS option that I thought could be useful as regards having a record of your speed etc.. in the event of an altercation. But I'd already spent me brass and I'm more than happy with the Mobius's video quality - I just wished .......

A little while ago, I downloaded Garmin Basecamp to use with my Garmin Nuvi satnav. I think they used to charge for it but its a freebie now   
I discovered that Basecamp can read your Nuvi's journey logs and produce a table of journey details. It splits the journey into "Legs" and produces a table with the headings, Index, Depth, Elevation, Leg distance, Leg time, Leg speed, Leg course, (date) Time, Position.
Below is a small copy & paste example from one of my journeys:

77 -28 ft 41 ft 0:00:01 28 mph 324.3° true 02/02/2014 13:52:25 N53 47.509 W2 41.318
78 -28 ft 0.1 mi 0:00:11 34 mph 323.9° true 02/02/2014 13:52:26 N53 47.514 W2 41.324
79 -33 ft 0.2 mi 0:00:18 36 mph 323.8° true 02/02/2014 13:52:37 N53 47.588 W2 41.415
80 -20 ft 412 ft 0:00:09 31 mph 323.8° true 02/02/2014 13:52:55 N53 47.714 W2 41.572


It might not be admissible in court, but it does give some evidence of your speed at the time, direction of travel etc..

Thought this might be of use to other Nuvi satnav owners.

Frank

I bought a dash cam at the show in Manchester in January. I am embarassed to say that I've never used it. Basically, I just forget to pick it up when I go out - and it's just another thing to remove and hide when you park the car/van.

I will make sure I use it in future - in fact, I'll go and put it in the car now ready for tomorrow. Better safe than sorry and I would be sick if anything happened and the camera was languishing on my kitchen worktop.

Nora

I'm afraid like Nora, I never use mine. It's another thing to plug into my cigar lighter, what with the sat nav, and phone charger, the dashboards getting a bit cluttered. It also comes with about 9 ft of cable. My may invest in a neater one like the Mobius in the future but for the time being, it's in the boot.

Paulmold wrote: It's another thing to plug into my cigar lighter, what with the sat nav, and phone charger, the dashboards getting a bit cluttered.

I have two fag lighter sockets hard wired into the fusebox, tucked up behind the dash, the satnav & camera are plugged into these permanently, I just unplug the device end of the usb lead when I remove them from the van. Leaves the in-dash fag lighter free for other stuff.

Frank

I've got two sockets in the car and a 3-socket extension thing in the van because I normally have satnav and iPod and now I've got this camera.

I've put the cable into the car and the camera itself is charging. I will use it tomorrow.

Nora

Hi Nora
Be interested to see the output from it, it looks quite neat. (it's the same as Paul's innit?). I'll bring the laptop next time we meet up and we can compare yours with the Mobius ones.

Frank

I use a 3-socket unit fixed under the dash, this is fed from the cig-lighter socket via a push-button plug, then the sat-nav, dash-cam & reversing cam are plugged into the 3 way unit, & each has its own pushbutton-on plug, so as soon as the ign is switched on, on come the sat-nav & dash-cam, then a push of a button, the reverse cam comes up on the GPS. All 'big-wiring' is out of sight, & the dash is 'tidy'.

boxerman wrote:Hi Nora
Be interested to see the output from it, it looks quite neat. (it's the same as Paul's innit?). I'll bring the laptop next time we meet up and we can compare yours with the Mobius ones.

Frank

Hi, Frank, yes it is the same as Paul's. He's only used his once or twice too. A comparison would be good, although I was quite impressed when we used Paul's but not sure what it would look like on a computer. I think somehow I have the idea in mind that I use it when I go away in the van on a journey, then I think how stupid that is, I drive around all the time and anything can happen anywhere. I must get myself sorted. It's all charged up now ready to take out this morning.

The wires can be a problem can't they? You sound as if you've got it sorted though, Modelman. I have wires trailing everywhere - the one for the dash cam must be about 6 ft long! It would go right round the windscreen if I hung the camera from the top of the screen but I've had to wind a lot up to put the camera at the bottom. I haven't decided the best place for it yet. 

Nora

I got a mini 0803 on Friday the newer model to the 0801. Fitted it yesterday and had a run up to lytham St Anne's camera seems to perform very well 1296p resolution. It has saved the whole journey there and back about 2hours on 32gb card not tested it in the dark yet but the PC viewer software is good it has a map on the side so you can see where you are a speedo some g sensors and a graph showing speed and braking.picture looks a bit funny when plugged into the TV via HDMI its not as clear as on the computer think it may be because its 1296p and the TV is only 1080p.

Mike

How much is the 803 Mike? if you don't mind me asking?
And what does it have over the 801?

Frank

Hi Frank i paid £83 for it from a company called joovuu in Stockport i think you can get them cheaper if you want to mess about importing. From the reviews its got a better chipset than the 0801 so is supposed to be better in the dark its higher res and a wider angle lens at 143 degree specs here it is the same casing and looks the same as the 801.

Mike

Thanks Mike,
I've heard of Joovuu, they also import / sell the Mobius and they developed a waterproof case for the Mobius.

IF I get the bike back on the road this year, I may use the mobius on the bike and buy an 803 for the van.

EDIT: how long is the power lead Mike?

Frank

I did not measure it maybe 2m I have ran it in the headlining and down the a post and into my glove box with plenty to reach down to the cig lighter socket which is down low in the centre console. I was going to buy the hardwire kit glad I did not now as the supplied lead is fine all hidden away. Yeah seen the Möbius stuff on joovuu it looks like a great small cam.

Mike

Well, I went out today and and set up the dash cam and switched it on. So far so good. Then I wondered why it wasn't recording. Stopped in a car park to have a look and found I'd switched off the "motion sensor" option. Right, turn that on. Carry on. Thing switched itself off. I'd knocked the plug in the lighter socket and it wasn't connecting. Try again. It works!! I now have half a journey to Chester recorded. It's going to take a bit of fiddling to find the right place on the car windscreen for it, though.

Because I have a car and the van, I thought I'd have to get another cable so I can leave one in each vehicle. It just happens to be the same cable as my old TomTom, which has now been superceded. 

Nora

mikejack wrote:I got a mini 0803 on Friday the newer model to the 0801.

Mike

Hi Mike, Matt at Techmoan has just uploaded his Mini 803 review http://www.techmoan.com/ if you're interested.
He shows some nightime footage compared to the 801 and it looks really good.

BTW
There is a forum dedicated to dashcams and the 803 has its own section http://dashcamtalk.com/forum/forums/mini-0803.72/

Frank

Cheers Frank i will take a look at that not been out in the dark with mine yet but the unit itself has been fine on a few trips to Lytham st Annes and Stafford upon Avon. The 32gb card seems to hold quite a few hours worth of video. He must live not far from me as he has drove through Newburgh on a few of his other video's and pemberton.

Mike

Somewhere near Manchester. He works in Manchester and commutes.

I am Seriously tempted to buy one, pleased as I am with the Mobius's performance, the GPS function, screen and poor light performance may just tempt me to part with my brass. I might have to go and lie down in a darkened room till these thoughts pass!   

Frank