Great advice for a Dash Cam fitment

jeffThunt9366 · Sep 10, 2022

Hi all,

quick message from a new member; I found the site whilst searching Google for advice on a permanent install for a dash cam. Followed the advice in the very detailed post from a member Loz, thanks for the advice, all fitted.

I was a bit disappointed in the quality of the workmanship in the fitment of the overhead console: I have a 2019 Ocean, when fitting the overhead console, VW over torqued the two front mounting bolts splitting the plastic around the bolt holes, one of the front plastic mounting points had also snapped clean off.

This was the first time the console has been removed from new. Fortunately superglue and washers provided an adequate fix.

I fitted a Garmin 67W using the Garmin parking mode cable; it was a very tight fit, but I managed to hide the converter/control box away on the left side, most of the extra cable I put under the headlining above the windscreen.

The Tall Luthier · Sep 10, 2022

I’ve been on some beautiful car journeys in my life, especially the ones over the cols in the Alpes and Pyrenees.

I’ve never thought of videoing them though, Do they make for entertaining films?

Sarcasm aside, I drive at the speed limit, my Cali has adaptive speed control so I never am too close to the car in front and I NEVER see things happening that I need to record, not in thirty years.

Why do people need dashcams?

Begize · Sep 10, 2022

The Tall Luthier said:
I’ve been on some beautiful car journeys in my life, especially the ones over the cols in the Alpes and Pyrenees.

I’ve never thought of videoing them though, Do they make for entertaining films?

Sarcasm aside, I drive at the speed limit, my Cali has adaptive speed control so I never am too close to the car in front and I NEVER see things happening that I need to record, not in thirty years.

Why do people need dashcams?

Because not all drivers are so careful and so honest when it comes to accidents.

HowieDog · Sep 10, 2022

Begize said:
Because not all drivers are so careful and so honest when it comes to accidents.

We were driven into from behind in our last car. We were stationary at the time but the other car tried to claim against us that we had reversed into them.
The dash cam footage showed this was a lie, the insurance company supported our claim and the footage went to the police re insurance fraud attempt.
Saved me a ton of hassle.

dspuk · Sep 10, 2022

Looking to install one myself but need to research them a bit more as well as how best to fit, hide the wires and hardwire in. No way I want one with wires hanging out and plugged into lighters all other the place. Some posts say hardwiring into a 6.1 tough as well as finding an always on fuse so need to look into more. The Road Angel Pro caught my eye and great discount on amazon atm. As others say - less worried about my driving but more others as well as having a camera system monitoring the van when on site and away from the Cali.

Jay586 · Sep 10, 2022

It's also if you witness an accident, the police want the video.

I used to video interactions as a job & it's amazing how much you miss, just trying to remember.

Ting Tong · Sep 11, 2022

jeffThunt9366 said:
Hi all,

quick message from a new member; I found the site whilst searching Google for advice on a permanent install for a dash cam. Followed the advice in the very detailed post from a member Loz, thanks for the advice, all fitted.

I was a bit disappointed in the quality of the workmanship in the fitment of the overhead console: I have a 2019 Ocean, when fitting the overhead console, VW over torqued the two front mounting bolts splitting the plastic around the bolt holes, one of the front plastic mounting points had also snapped clean off.

Ours was the same! It’s held together for 4 years with just washers tho.

Georgeo · Sep 11, 2022

The Tall Luthier said:
I’ve been on some beautiful car journeys in my life, especially the ones over the cols in the Alpes and Pyrenees.

I’ve never thought of videoing them though, Do they make for entertaining films?

Sarcasm aside, I drive at the speed limit, my Cali has adaptive speed control so I never am too close to the car in front and I NEVER see things happening that I need to record, not in thirty years.

Why do people need dashcams?

I had the same opinion until a car had two goes at trying to crash into me. Swerving and braking in front of me. No idea what it was about as had not even been involved with the vehicle.

Beaker · Sep 17, 2022

jeffThunt9366 said:
Hi all,

quick message from a new member; I found the site whilst searching Google for advice on a permanent install for a dash cam. Followed the advice in the very detailed post from a member Loz, thanks for the advice, all fitted.

I was a bit disappointed in the quality of the workmanship in the fitment of the overhead console: I have a 2019 Ocean, when fitting the overhead console, VW over torqued the two front mounting bolts splitting the plastic around the bolt holes, one of the front plastic mounting points had also snapped clean off.

This was the first time the console has been removed from new. Fortunately superglue and washers provided an adequate fix.

I fitted a Garmin 67W using the Garmin parking mode cable; it was a very tight fit, but I managed to hide the converter/control box away on the left side, most of the extra cable I put under the headlining above the windscreen.

Can you provide some pictures of the fitment, please. Is there a link to the instructions mentioned. I cannot see one.

ArunAlec · Sep 17, 2022

The Tall Luthier said:
I’ve been on some beautiful car journeys in my life, especially the ones over the cols in the Alpes and Pyrenees.

I’ve never thought of videoing them though, Do they make for entertaining films?

Sarcasm aside, I drive at the speed limit, my Cali has adaptive speed control so I never am too close to the car in front and I NEVER see things happening that I need to record, not in thirty years.

Why do people need dashcams?

Ask @GrannyJen About her French trip/shoot out!

Hawthorn37 · Sep 17, 2022

We decided to fit one before our various UK and EU trips this year. It records the journey, “events” on the Road, and parking events. I hope we’ll never need to use the footage, but road rage events earlier this year - regularly being cut up and pulled out on, persuaded us to pay the cash.

One priority was to make the installation as unobtrusive as possible. We settled on the Blackvue range, with a front and rear camera. There was no way I was going to install it, pulling off internal panels etc., so we had a firm based in Nottingham do it - TTW Installations. They predicted a 4 hour install, with most time on routing the rear camera cable. In fact in took over 5 hours, but we were very happy with the end result.

For the parking function, a connection to a permanent live is needed, but I didn’t need to direct TTW in any way, they know theyre doing.

GrumpyGranddad · Sep 17, 2022

Hawthorn37 said:
We decided to fit one before our various UK and EU trips this year. It records the journey, “events” on the Road, and parking events. I hope we’ll never need to use the footage, but road rage events earlier this year - regularly being cut up and pulled out on, persuaded us to pay the cash.

One priority was to make the installation as unobtrusive as possible. We settled on the Blackvue range, with a front and rear camera. There was no way I was going to install it, pulling off internal panels etc., so we had a firm based in Nottingham do it - TTW Installations. They predicted a 4 hour install, with most time on routing the rear camera cable. In fact in took over 5 hours, but we were very happy with the end result.

For the parking function, a connection to a permanent live is needed, but I didn’t need to direct TTW in any way, they know theyre doing.

View attachment 99452

View attachment 99453

Identical to my Blackvue installation done by SatNav Systems. Regarding Parking Mode I would say that it is essential to have the Blackvue Power Magic Pro also installed otherwise you risk a flat starter battery.

Hawthorn37 · Sep 17, 2022

GrumpyGranddad said:
Identical to my Blackvue installation done by SatNav Systems. Regarding Parking Mode I would say that it is essential to have the Blackvue Power Magic Pro also installed otherwise you risk a flat starter battery.

Not yet been a problem. When we’re on a site, and the van isn’t moving and we’re around, I tend to disable parking mode, and on the driveway set it to time lapse.

Saesneg Shaun · Sep 18, 2022

The Tall Luthier said:
I’ve been on some beautiful car journeys in my life, especially the ones over the cols in the Alpes and Pyrenees.

I’ve never thought of videoing them though, Do they make for entertaining films?

Sarcasm aside, I drive at the speed limit, my Cali has adaptive speed control so I never am too close to the car in front and I NEVER see things happening that I need to record, not in thirty years.

Why do people need dashcams?

Iv'e just fitted one.
last week I dared to change lanes whilst driving in a 50mph zone, A guy in the Audi S7 200yds back but doing something like 90+ screamed up to within about 2ft of the Cali rear bumper. He then undertook us, moved back out a slammed his brakes on, I stopped but when we started moving again he brake checked us again.

If I had hit him it would have gone down as my fault.
Why wouldn't you want one with the idiots on the road these days and the absence of a Police threat?

GrannyJen · Sep 18, 2022

The Tall Luthier said:
I’ve been on some beautiful car journeys in my life, especially the ones over the cols in the Alpes and Pyrenees.

I’ve never thought of videoing them though, Do they make for entertaining films?

Sarcasm aside, I drive at the speed limit, my Cali has adaptive speed control so I never am too close to the car in front and I NEVER see things happening that I need to record, not in thirty years.

Why do people need dashcams?

As @ArunAlec prompted :shocked

I was visiting family in Pezenas, south of France. My nephew was short of currency so as I always carry a lot I offered to help him out.

Stood in the road outside the villa we were renting and two blokes came running towards us. I remarked that it was a bit hot to be out for a run but before I even finished speaking there was a couple of loud cracks before my nephew pulled me back into the Villa. Chasing after these two blokes was a bloke with a gun that he was firing wildly roughly in my direction but worse, in the direction of Albert, my camper.

Roll on four hours. People in white overalls outside doing finger tip searches: residents locked in their houses: Gendarmes patrolling the road. In my best schoolgirl French I started chatting to one of them. My dash cam had been rolling, captured everything, would he like to see it?

10 minutes later I'm in Brigade headquarters, Le Colonel grinning like a Cheshire Cat as he patiently scrolled through camera footage that captured everything, including the sweating assailant who stopped to remove the scarf around his head revealing his face, , wrapping it instead around his hand to conceal the gun, all the time leaning against the door frame of our villa staring straight into Albert's camera!!

Naturally we had to have a family portrait of the Gendarme bundling me into a car to be taken to brigade HQ

GrannyJen · Sep 18, 2022

Dashcams can capture wonderful memories, and you only need to have it on for a few seconds and it can save you so much hassle,, increased insurance premiums or be used to get an idiot in court.

My Bicycle cam caught someone passing me within elbow-touching distance squeezing between me, the kerb and a bollard in the middle of the road. Normally I don't bother about close passes but this was extreme. That evening I uploaded it to my local operation crackdown, anti social driving unit. 10am the following day and I was advised that a notice of intended prosecution was being sent out and would I complete a witness statement.

ThomasHJ · Sep 18, 2022

The Tall Luthier said:
I’ve been on some beautiful car journeys in my life, especially the ones over the cols in the Alpes and Pyrenees.

I’ve never thought of videoing them though, Do they make for entertaining films?

Sarcasm aside, I drive at the speed limit, my Cali has adaptive speed control so I never am too close to the car in front and I NEVER see things happening that I need to record, not in thirty years.

Why do people need dashcams?

Had another car bump into my parked cali twice now. Both times they left the scene without leaving their contact info. Leaving me with a very expensive dent annd paintjob, twice. Dashcam sounds good to me.

Hawthorn37 · Sep 18, 2022

GrannyJen said:
As @ArunAlec prompted

I was visiting family in Pezenas, south of France. My nephew was short of currency so as I always carry a lot I offered to help him out.

Stood in the road outside the villa we were renting and two blokes came running towards us. I remarked that it was a bit hot to be out for a run but before I even finished speaking there was a couple of loud cracks before my nephew pulled me back into the Villa. Chasing after these two blokes was a bloke with a gun that he was firing wildly roughly in my direction but worse, in the direction of Albert, my camper.

Roll on four hours. People in white overalls outside doing finger tip searches: residents locked in their houses: Gendarmes patrolling the road. In my best schoolgirl French I started chatting to one of them. My dash cam had been rolling, captured everything, would he like to see it?

10 minutes later I'm in Brigade headquarters, Le Colonel grinning like a Cheshire Cat as he patiently scrolled through camera footage that captured everything, including the sweating assailant who stopped to remove the scarf around his head, wrapping it instead around his hand to conceal the gun, all the time leaning against the door frame of our villa staring straight into Albert's camera!!

Naturally we had to have a family portrait of the Gendarme bundling me into a car to be taken to brigade HQ

View attachment 99462

View attachment 99464

Could get your own tv series - Granny Jen Investigates - it’s got a good ring to it

GrannyJen · Sep 18, 2022

Hawthorn37 said:
Could get your own tv series - Granny Jen Investigates - it’s got a good ring to it

My "family" had great pleasure in circulating the photographs with the title of "granny goes to the slammer" :shocked

dspuk · Oct 8, 2022

Hawthorn37 said:
We decided to fit one before our various UK and EU trips this year. It records the journey, “events” on the Road, and parking events. I hope we’ll never need to use the footage, but road rage events earlier this year - regularly being cut up and pulled out on, persuaded us to pay the cash.

One priority was to make the installation as unobtrusive as possible. We settled on the Blackvue range, with a front and rear camera. There was no way I was going to install it, pulling off internal panels etc., so we had a firm based in Nottingham do it - TTW Installations. They predicted a 4 hour install, with most time on routing the rear camera cable. In fact in took over 5 hours, but we were very happy with the end result.

For the parking function, a connection to a permanent live is needed, but I didn’t need to direct TTW in any way, they know theyre doing.

View attachment 99452

View attachment 99453

Cheers, been using these images in earnest as my BlackVue DR900X PLUS came yesterday. Got the front camera and LTE unit installed in a few hours with all cables hidden. Most of that was trying to find the perm live in the fuse box - cracked it in the end, been on fine all night. I was going to just clip the front wires along the unit but looking again at this they managed to tuck into the Cali camera unit so will give that a go. Back one to do today which is either going to be easy or do my head in. All my car trim tools at the ready! The LTE unit is a revelation - hummed and hawed on built in or separate LTE and the CM100LTE is brilliant and allows 4 devices to connect, so that is now also my in Cali wifi sorted at the same time. 40gb a month for 4 quid a bargain too.

Hawthorn37 · Oct 8, 2022

dspuk said:
Cheers, been using these images in earnest as my BlackVue DR900X PLUS came yesterday. Got the front camera and LTE unit installed in a few hours with all cables hidden. Most of that was trying to find the perm live in the fuse box - cracked it in the end, been on fine all night. I was going to just clip the front wires along the unit but looking again at this they managed to tuck into the Cali camera unit so will give that a go. Back one to do today which is either going to be easy or do my head in. All my car trim tools at the ready! The LTE unit is a revelation - hummed and hawed on built in or separate LTE and the CM100LTE is brilliant and allows 4 devices to connect, so that is now also my in Cali wifi sorted at the same time. 40gb a month for 4 quid a bargain too.

For the rear cam, they fed the cables within the trim above the sliding door (they said they’d taken the trim off, and found it better than the kitchen side.

dspuk · Oct 8, 2022

Hawthorn37 said:
For the rear cam, they fed the cables within the trim above the sliding door (they said they’d taken the trim off, and found it better than the kitchen side.

Brill - ta. Definately the side I need to go as my camera is driver side behind the mirror.

dspuk · Oct 9, 2022

GrumpyGranddad said:
Identical to my Blackvue installation done by SatNav Systems. Regarding Parking Mode I would say that it is essential to have the Blackvue Power Magic Pro also installed otherwise you risk a flat starter battery.

Not needed thankfully on the X series. We just bought the DR900X plus and the power magic functionality is now built in. Same for the 750X as well.

dspuk · Oct 9, 2022

Hawthorn37 said:
For the rear cam, they fed the cables within the trim above the sliding door (they said they’d taken the trim off, and found it better than the kitchen side.

Well, that was a massive 6 hour failure. Managed to get it as far as the back camera to the drop down locker corner opposite the wardrobes nice and neat but no further. Flexible rods on order! You can pop put the aircon and lights and see the route easy enough but just coudnt feed the cable there and hand cut to ribbons! Also found that to have the neatest solution you need the 10M cable, not the 6M it comes with. Technically it looks easier to actually go via the cupboards (which would work with 6M) but then my cable is on the wrong side of the Cali. Sometimes it’s worth paying the 100 quid for professionals to do it!

rod_vw · Oct 9, 2022

My two sons are both becoming Tesla drivers, one has his already. These cars are equipped with at least four cameras that can be recalled on the car's own screen (dashboard) or via an app. The cameras, are one facing forwards, one backwards and one down each side. There are also two more that look downwards outside from the top of the B pillar which he hasn't managed to access yet.
Within a week of owning the Tesla he had had a very near miss with an oversize tractor travelling at speed on a country lane. The footage makes chilling viewing! The tractor had no number plate so it was not possible to report its behaviour.

Great advice for a Dash Cam fitment

jeffThunt9366

The Tall Luthier

Begize

HowieDog

dspuk

Dave

Jay586

Ting Tong

Georgeo

Beaker

ArunAlec

Hawthorn37

Retired, and working hard at it

GrumpyGranddad

Hawthorn37

Retired, and working hard at it

Saesneg Shaun

GrannyJen

GrannyJen

ThomasHJ

Hawthorn37

Retired, and working hard at it

GrannyJen

dspuk

Dave

Hawthorn37

Retired, and working hard at it

dspuk

Dave

dspuk

Dave

dspuk

Dave

rod_vw

Gone bigger.

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